The e-commerce arm of India's payment giant PayTM -- PayTM Mall, is expected to raise $600 million from Japan's Softbank, reported Economic Times lately.
The funding deal of Paytm Mall with SoftBank is in advance stages right now and is expected to close by end of this month, said the report.
The latest round, if materializes, is expected to value PayTM Mall at about $2 billion.
Moreover, the startup is also in talks with Singapore’s Temasek Holdings and China’s Primavera Capital Group to raise another ₹1000 Crore, as it gears up to take on other e-commerce players in India such as Amazon and Flipkart. Existing investor SAIF Partners is also expected to participate in the upcoming funding round.
If the deal goes through, this will Softbank’s third bet in the online retail market, after backing Snapdeal in 2014 and Flipkart in 2017.
At present, Chinese ecommerce Alibaba and its payment affiliate Ant Financial hold a majority stake of about 55% in Paytm Mall. Post the upcoming Softbank funding, combined shareholding of Alibaba and Ant Financial is expected to get diluted to a significant minority.
It to be noted that both Primavera and Temasek, which are also poised to invest in PayTM Mall, have invested in multiple Alibaba Group companies, including Alibaba and Ant Financial.
Paytm Mall is rapidly expanding and is fast bringing in more FMCG brands on its platform and getting into hyperlocal tie-ups with grocers to increase its logistics. In April 2017, it launched O2O commerce platform to enable shopkeepers sell their products using PayTM QR code. The startup also invested $35 million in tech and logistics, in last August.
Last October, the startup reported that it suffered loss of Rs13.63 crore on total sales of Rs7.35 crore in the year ended 31 March 2017.
To recall, in last November IndianWeb2 was among first to report that Paytm Mall had started discussions with SoftBank to raise around $500 million.
The funding deal of Paytm Mall with SoftBank is in advance stages right now and is expected to close by end of this month, said the report.
The latest round, if materializes, is expected to value PayTM Mall at about $2 billion.
Moreover, the startup is also in talks with Singapore’s Temasek Holdings and China’s Primavera Capital Group to raise another ₹1000 Crore, as it gears up to take on other e-commerce players in India such as Amazon and Flipkart. Existing investor SAIF Partners is also expected to participate in the upcoming funding round.
If the deal goes through, this will Softbank’s third bet in the online retail market, after backing Snapdeal in 2014 and Flipkart in 2017.
At present, Chinese ecommerce Alibaba and its payment affiliate Ant Financial hold a majority stake of about 55% in Paytm Mall. Post the upcoming Softbank funding, combined shareholding of Alibaba and Ant Financial is expected to get diluted to a significant minority.
It to be noted that both Primavera and Temasek, which are also poised to invest in PayTM Mall, have invested in multiple Alibaba Group companies, including Alibaba and Ant Financial.
Paytm Mall is rapidly expanding and is fast bringing in more FMCG brands on its platform and getting into hyperlocal tie-ups with grocers to increase its logistics. In April 2017, it launched O2O commerce platform to enable shopkeepers sell their products using PayTM QR code. The startup also invested $35 million in tech and logistics, in last August.
Last October, the startup reported that it suffered loss of Rs13.63 crore on total sales of Rs7.35 crore in the year ended 31 March 2017.
To recall, in last November IndianWeb2 was among first to report that Paytm Mall had started discussions with SoftBank to raise around $500 million.
Advertisements