Sachin Bansal’s Navi Technologies, a fintech business that provides clients with insurance and credit products, has filed for a $440 million IPO, signalling that the 40-year-old entrepreneur who made his fortune by launching India’s e-commerce boom is taking another risk.
Navi Technologies’ IPO will be fully made up of new shares, and the company may contemplate a pre-IPO placement, according to a draught prospectus filed with the local regulator on Saturday.
The IPO comes at a time when most other companies, including tech firms, have been falling in recent months. In recent weeks, all tech businesses that went public last year, such as Zomato, Paytm, Nykaa, and PolicyBazaar, have traded at their lowest share prices.
However, for Navi Technologies, which has been considering an IPO for more than a year, there is a sense of urgency in taking the company public. According to two people familiar with the situation, the startup’s most recent attempt to raise money from SoftBank and other investors at a valuation of over $4 billion collapsed after it was unable to get a bank licence.
In the finance market, Navi was founded in 2018 and offers digital personal loans, house loans, and credit against the property. It also offers health insurance and digital asset management with an emphasis on passive funds to its consumers. Bansal has so far provided nearly all of the startup’s funding.
Billionaire Bansal, who co-founded Flipkart over a decade ago but was driven out before the business was sold to Walmart, and Navi have generally avoided the spotlight. For the first time, the draught prospectus (PDF) provides details on Navi’s numerous companies and financial condition.
Customers may sign up for personal financing and retail health insurance in less than 4.5 minutes and 2.5 minutes, respectively, according to the firm, which posted a consolidated profit of $9.2 million on revenue of $17.8 million in FY21.
Navi’s loans company has served over 481,000 consumers in 84 per cent of Indian zip codes in the 21 months since its launch and has extended 2 million Indian rupees to them with terms up to 84 months. These loans have a $665 ticket size.
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