Private Equity firms obtained exit routes for their investments in 29 Indian companies during the quarter ended June 2013, up 38% over the 21 exits in the same period a year ago, says data from Venture Intelligence, a research service focused on private company financials, transactions and valuations in India. The exit volumes were also 21% higher than that in the in the immediate previous quarter (which had witnessed 24 exits). Of the divestitures during the latest quarter, 21 represented complete exits; the remainder partial ones.
The sole PE-backed IPO during the latest quarter – that of Internet- and mobile-based local search firm JustDial – provided a healthy exit for its investors SAIF, Tiger Global, Sequoia Capital India and SAP Ventures whose sale of shares comprised over 80% of the Rs.927.37 crore ($167.11 million) issue. At the IPO price, SAIF was sitting on an over 10x return on its investment; Tiger Global, 7.3x; Sequoia Capital India, over 2x and SAP Ventures, 1.3x. The JustDial IPO marks the second successful Indian “Internet play” brought to the public markets by SAIF, following the Nasdaq IPO of MakeMyTrip in August 2010.
The strategic sale of online bus ticketing service redBus to South Africa-headquartered media group Naspers for a reported $100 million capped a good quarter for Venture Capital exits. Starting in Jul-2007, redBus had raised about $9.3 million from VC investors including Seedfund, Inventus Capital and Helion Ventures. Six out of the seven Strategic Sales were of VC-backed IT companies including that of online marketing services firm WebChutney (sale by Capital18 to ad agency Japanese ad agency Dentsu) and the acquisition of another of Nexus Ventures’ US-based portfolio companies – mobile productivity apps firm Astrid – by Yahoo.