One of the co-founders of India’s largest e-commerce firm Flipkart, Binny Bansal is looking to sell his stake and exit the company following Walmart-Flipkart deal.
Sachin Bansal and Binny Bansal are both planning to sell their stake once the deal goes through, but Sachin is still interested in hanging around in the firm they founded 11 years ago, said a Factor Daily report quoting independent sources.
At present, Bansals reportedly claim to own 5.5 percent each in Flipkart. The upcoming Walmart investment is likely to value the online marketplace to the tune of $20 billion. Hence, both Bansals will make $1.10 billion (or Rs 7344 crore) each.
Walmart, as per the latest report, is likely to acquire 51 percent stake, paying anything between $8 billion (Rs 53,450 crore) and $12 billion (Rs 80,180 crore), in Flipkart as early as next week.
The US retail giant has been in talks with Flipkart for months to acquire a controlling stake in the firm as it looks to take on rival Amazon.com Inc head-on in India, a market where e-commerce is tipped to grow to $200 billion in an upcoming decade.
Two another sources added that some of these things can change at the last moment as nothing is final. But Binny exit seems more likely.
Related Post: Flipkart journey: How a modest online bookstore became a multibillion-dollar e-commerce platform
Current shareholding structure of Flipkart
SoftBank which owns one-fifth of the Bengaluru-based marketplace had appeared as a major hurdle in the deal. However, the Japanese tech titan has given a green signal to it and slated to bag $4 billion exits.
Earlier, in August last year, Flipkart had closed the deal with SoftBank, which bought the stake worth at least $2.6 billion. Post pouring in a massive round, SoftBank owns about 21 percent of the firm.
The New York-based Tiger Global, one of the major backers of Flipkart, witnessed its shareholding reduced from 33.6 percent to 20.5 percent as it sold out 13 percent stake to SoftBank in the secondary purchase.
The Japanese conglomerate invested roughly $1.4 billion directly in the e-commerce company.
Meanwhile, Binny Bansal shareholding fell from 7.6 percent to 5.2 percent, when he sold shares worth $30-35 million in the secondary buyback led by SoftBank last year.
Sachin and Binny investments in startups
Besides building and scaling Flipkart, both founders also have backed many startups in personal capacities.
So far, Sachin has invested in seven ventures including Inshorts, Ather Energy, Unacademy, and SpoonJoy (not operational) with a total funding of $26 million, while Binny Bansal has invested about $32 million across 17 companies.
Apart from co-investing with Sachin, Binny also wrote cheques for fashion portal Roposo and gaming company MadRatGames.
Bansals in December, have incorporated Sabin Advisors, a new company, which could include venture capital funding and insurance.
Related Post: How Sachin Bansal started: Life of Flipkart founder