Ambani’s Jio Platforms IPO pivots to pure fundraising, no investor exits, sources say

By Aditya Kalra and Vibhuti Sharma

MUMBAI, May 11 (Reuters) – Indian billionaire Mukesh Ambani’s Reliance Jio Platforms has shifted its planned Mumbai IPO to a pure fundraising exercise, abandoning earlier plans that would have allowed major foreign investors to sell some of their shares, two sources said on Monday.

​Jio Platforms, which owns the world’s second-largest telecom company by users after China Mobile, counts Meta, Alphabet’s Google and Vista Equity Partners among its investors. Its initial public offering has been long-awaited and could be India’s largest ever.

The firm earlier held discussions with its foreign investors for each to sell 8% of their individual holdings in the IPO, totalling 2.5% of the company, Reuters reported previously. That would have allowed new investors to come in and let foreign investors sell some of their holdings without any fresh fundraising in a process called an offer-for-sale in India.

That plan has been dropped, two sources with direct knowledge of the matter said. They requested anonymity because they were not authorised to speak to the media.

Reliance now plans to raise fresh funds totalling 2.5% of the company’s size. “Investors were not keen to sell and wanted to stay invested for the long term,” one of the sources said.

The Economic Times was first to report on the company’s plans to pivot to a fresh fundraising with the offering on Monday.

Jio Platforms did not respond to a Reuters request for comment.

WAR OVERHANG

The filing for the Jio Platforms IPO, which was expected as early as March, was pushed back following the outbreak of the U.S.-Israeli war on Iran, with investors losing appetite for new listings.

In March, Walmart-backed Indian fintech firm PhonePe paused plans for an IPO, citing geopolitical ​tensions and volatility in global capital markets.

The Iran war is certainly an “overhang,” said the first source, speaking about Jio Platform’s delayed IPO filing.

Jio Platforms’ listing is a key plank of Ambani’s long-term vision to transform Reliance from an oil-and-chemicals giant into an “everything company” spanning consumer, retail and technology.

In 2020, Jio raised funds from major global investors who were betting on India’s rapidly expanding digital economy where smartphone penetration is accelerating, internet costs are among the lowest in the world and a young, mobile-first population is coming online.

In November, investment bank Jefferies estimated Reliance Jio’s valuation would be $180 billion. Sources told Reuters in January that the IPO could be worth as much as $4 billion, though final numbers would be decided later.

Reliance Jio Platforms has hired 17 banks to manage its Mumbai listing.

(Reporting by Aditya Kalra and Vibhuti Sharma; Editing by Sonali Paul and Thomas Derpinghaus)