Prosus Acquires Over 5% Stake In ixigo

SUMMARY

Prosus acquired 1.3 Cr shares, or a 3.16% stake, of ixigo via an off-market secondary acquisition from Peak XV Partners

SAIF Partners India IV Limited (fund managed by Elevation Capital) also said it sold 1.4 Cr shares of ixigo in a mix of open and off market transactions

This comes at a time when Prosus is preparing for a fresh fund infusion of INR 1,296 Cr in ixigo

Global investor Prosus acquired 1.3 Cr shares, or a 3.16% stake, of ixigo via an off-market secondary acquisition from Peak XV Partners on October 10.

In an exchange filing on October 13, Prosus said it acquired the shares via its wholly owned subsidiary MIH Investments One B.V. As per the stock’s closing price of INR 318.75 on October 10, the transaction was worth INR 414.4 Cr (about $47 Mn).

After the deal, MIH Investments’ stake in the travel tech major rose to 5.06% from 1.90% earlier ixigo.

In a separate filing on October 14, Peak XV said it sold 1.3 Cr shares of ixigo on the same day, after which its shareholding in the company declined to 6.38% from 9.54% earlier.

In yet another filing, SAIF Partners India IV Limited (fund managed by Elevation Capital) said it sold 1.4 Cr shares of ixigo in a mix of open and off market transactions. As per the stock’s closing price on October 10, Elevation Capital netted INR 446.2 Cr (about $50.6 Mn) by offloading the stake.

After the stake sale, Elevation Capital’s ownership in ixigo reduced to 2.49% from 5.76%.

Shares of ixigo ended today’s trading session 5.5% higher at INR 327.45 on the BSE.

Notably, both Peak XV and Elevation Capital are pre-IPO investors in the travel tech major and have been selling shares of the company to book gains. Peak XV offloaded 1.3 Cr shares of ixigo via the OFS component in the travel tech company’s IPO last year, while SAIF Partners sold 1.9 Cr shares.

Prior to the IPO, Peak XV also sold 70 Lakh shares of ixigo at INR 93 apiece in a pre-IPO secondary sale for INR 65 Cr. Meanwhile, Elevation Capital reduced its stake in ixigo via multiple block deals this year.

Prosus Bets Big On ixigo

The latest development comes days after ixigo’s board approved a fresh infusion of INR 1,296 Cr in the company from Prosus. The board approved the allotment of 4.62 Cr equity shares to MIH Investments

Prosus would acquire an additional 10.1% stake in ixigo through this. ixigo has convened an extraordinary general meeting on November 1 to seek the approval of its shareholders for the fundraise.

ixigo plans to use the fresh proceeds for organic and inorganic growth opportunities, working capital requirement, and general corporate purposes. This includes developing new AI-powered product launches, while some unidentified acquisitions are also on the cards.

Notably, ixigo had told the exchanges earlier that a potential investor was looking to acquire up to 16% stake in the company.

This would be the first major investment by Prosus in a listed company which is an active investor in the Indian startup ecosystem. Prosus has made investments worth over $8.6 Bn in India to date and was one of the early investors in companies like Flipkart and Goibibo.

Prosus is also buying Rapido shares held by Swiggy. Last month, the foodtech major said that it will sell its 10 equity shares and 1.64 Lakh Series D CCPS in Rapido to MIH Investments for INR 1,968 Cr.