New Delhi, Oct. 10 -- Dutch technology investor Prosus, an investor in marquee Indian private companies including PayU, Rapido among others, has bought a stake in Mumbai-listed travel-tech platform ixigo, operated by Le Travenues Technology Ltd.
Prosus will acquire a stake of 10.10% for Rs 1,295.6 crore ($146 million) in ixigo, the Indian company said Friday. This comes after it informed stock exchanges of receiving interest from an investor earlier this week.
Prosus, through its subsidiary MIH Investments One BV, will buy 46.27 million shares of ixigo at a price of Rs 280 apiece. This is lower than ixigo's closing share price of Rs 317.8 on Thursday.
Ixigo's share price has more than doubled in the last six months, from Rs 141 on April 1 to around Rs 310 on Friday.
The deal marks Prosus' first investment in an Indian company that is already publicly listed. The Dutch firm has traditionally made late-stage investments in privately held tech-focused companies in India, although it has retained its stake in some portfolio companies that went public including Swiggy, Bluestone, and Urban Company.
Prosus does not operate in a manner similar to traditional private equity and venture capital firms, which are limited by the lifecycle of the investment vehicle they invest from. Instead, it can offer 'patient capital' to its portfolio companies. This allows Prosus itself to wait for breakout returns before it exits.
Prosus and its South African parent firm Naspers' chief executive officer Fabricio Bloisi, who took over the role last year in July, highlighted the investors' intentions to build a $50-billion company out of India. The global firm has a particular focus on high-growth markets in India, Latin America, and Europe.
So far, Prosus has invested more than $8.6 billion in India across sectors such as e-commerce, food delivery, travel, payments and fintech, and classifieds. It has bet on more than 30 companies such as ecommerce platform Meesho, non-bank lender Vastu Housing Finance and beleaguered edtech company Byju's. Recently, it also upped its stake in Rapido, operated by Roppen Transportation Services Pvt Ltd, buying additional shares worth Rs 1,968 crore.
Meanwhile, ixigo said in its latest disclosure that it plans to use the fresh capital raised from Prosus to invest in emerging and disruptive technologies, build stronger brand awareness, maintain a cushion for potential inorganic opportunities, and support working capital needs as it grows. It said the funds will be equally split across organic and inorganic growth opportunities, to meet working capital requirements and general corporate purposes.
"We believe that our company is at an inflection point in fulfilling its vision of building the best customer experience for travellers and the immediate opportunity is to invest deeply in emerging agentic AI capabilities, solidify our presence in hotels, build top-of-mind brand recall and accelerate our growth through judicious investments in new AI platforms, products and services," ixigo said.
Co-founded by Aloke Bajpai and Rajnish Kumar, ixigo's other investors include Bay Capital, Steadview Capital, Elevation Capital, Peak XV Partners (formerly Sequoia Capital India), Singapore wealth fund GIC, and venture debt and equity investor Trifecta. Recently, British asset management firm Schroders, also bought shares of ixigo through secondary market transactions, and owns nearly 7.18% stake in the company, according to disclosures.
The company went public in June last year. Its IPO was oversubscribed by more than 98 times. Its stock is up nearly 82% from IPO price.
Published by HT Digital Content Services with permission from VC Circle.