Travel booking application ixigo is looking to increase Rs 750 crore through a primary fundraise and Rs 850 crore via an offer for sale (OFS) from existing investors as part of its initial public offering, as per the firm’s draft red herring prospectus (DRHP) filed with the capital markets regulator.
The DRHP for the Rs 1,600 crore raise was filed Thursday evening. While Le Travenues Technology Ltd, the firm that operates the online ticketing platform would see existing investors Micromax and Elevation Capital (formerly Saif Partners) exit partially through an OFS, its other older investor MakeMyTrip has already exited the firm through a secondary sale clocking, 8x returns on its $4.8 million investment, ET reported earlier this week.
The promoters, Aloke Bajpai and Rajnish Kumar
are also looking to trade their stakes through the IPO, the draft prospectus shows.
Previous month, as part of its pre-IPO round, the company raised $53 million (Rs 395 crore) from investors led by Singapore sovereign wealth fund GIC with participation from investors such as Info Edge Ventures, White Oak, Bay Capital, Orios Venture Partners, Trifecta Capital and Malabar Investments.
As per sources, the firm is presently being valued at around $850 million and is likely to launch its IPO later this year.
Launched in 2007, ixigo has a user base of more than 250 million. Earlier this year, it bought Bengaluru-based online train discovery and booking platform Confirmtkt for an undisclosed amount. Last week, the firm said it has acquired AbhiBus, a Hyderabad-based bus ticketing and aggregation platform on a slump sale basis.
The travel sector has been severely hit in the last 18 months due to the Covid-19 pandemic. Nevertheless, travel and hospitality companies have seen a revival with markets like US and Europe opening up as more than 50% of their population has been vaccinated. In India, too airlines and hospitality firms have clocked better occupancy rates post the devastating second wave of the Covid-19 virus.
Investment banks ICICI Securities, Axis Capital, Kotak Mahindra Capital and Nomura are the book managers of the issue while law firms such as Shardul Amarchand Mangaldas and Khaitan & Co are advising the company on legal matters.
