Bengaluru/Mumbai, June 2 -- Tata Sons infused capital into Tata Digital at a lower valuation in April, for the first time marking down its value, at a time when its cash burn and weak consumer acceptance have attracted scrutiny from the trusts controlling the Tata Group. Tata Sons infused just under Rs.3,000 crore in Tata Digital at a valuation of $10.3 billion, which is 5.5% lower than the valuation at which the company last received capital in February 2025. Back then, Tata Sons had infused just under Rs.4,000 crore in the privately owned company. The markdown comes at a time when Tata Trusts chair Noel Tata has sought a clear roadmap from Tata Sons chair N. Chandrasekaran on the group's new businesses. Tata Sons owns 99% of Tata Digital, while Ratan Tata Endowment Foundation (RTEF) owns 1%. They invested Rs.2,970 crore and Rs.30 crore, respectively, in Tata Digital, valuing its shares at Rs.47.75 each, according to a disclosure filed with the ministry of corporate affairs last week. In February 2025, the duo had invested Rs.4,000 crore at Rs.52.1 a share, according to separate filings reviewed by Mint. RTEF is a not-for-profit entity set up in 2022 by the late Ratan Tata, the former chairperson of Tata Trusts and Tata Sons. At these valuations, Tata Digital's per-share value declined by 8.35%. The pre-money valuation, before the Rs.3,000 crore infusion, fell by 4.7%, while the post-money valuation declined by 5.5%, from Rs.1,03,688 crore in February last year to Rs.98,031 crore. The difference between pre- and post-money valuations is due to the increase in shares between the two investment periods in February last year and in April, as well as a smaller investment than in the last period. Tata Digital was founded in 2019, aiming to build a one-stop app offering everything from shopping to cab-hailing. Including the latest infusion, the Tata Group has invested Rs.26,306 crore in Tata Digital till date. The latest cash infusion came just a few weeks before top executives of the new ventures -Air India CEO Campbell Wilson, Tata Electronics CEO Randhir Thakur, Agratas CEO Thomas Flack and Tata Digital CEO Sajith Sivanandan-briefed the Tata Sons board in May about the performance of their businesses. A three-year roadmap detailing performance and capital requirements for the businesses was also shared with the Tata Sons board. An email sent to Tata Digital seeking comment went unanswered. The markdown in Tata Digital's valuation should not be read as a collapse in confidence, but it does indicate a reset in expectations, according to Saptarshi Purkayastha, professor (Strategic Management), Indian Institute of Management Calcutta. "The lower valuation suggests that Tata Sons may now be applying a more disciplined lens to capital allocation," he said. "In my opinion, for Tata Digital's leadership, the reported markdown may represent an important moment of reassessment. The mandate is unlikely to be only about building a large super-app ecosystem; it will increasingly be about demonstrating the economics of that ecosystem."...