Infibeam's Rs. 450 Crore IPO Opens on Monday

Online shopping portal Infibeam Incorporation will hit the capital markets on Monday to raise Rs. 450 crores through an initial share plan, becoming the first e-commerce firm to take the IPO route. The company has fixed the price band at Rs. 360-432 per equity share for the initial public offer (IPO). The initial share-sale programme will conclude on March 23.

As per the Draft Red Herring Prospectus, Gujarat-based Infibeam plans to come out with public issue of equity shares worth up to Rs. 450 crores. Infibeam competes with Flipkart, Amazon, Snapdeal and others in the e-commerce space.

The capital markets watchdog had already announced a new set of easier norms for listing of startups on a separate platform of stock exchanges. However, Infibeam has decided to go for listing on the main board.

Started in 2007, Infibeam runs several e-commerce services including Infibeam.com, BuildaBazaar, Incept and Picsquare.

The company has proposed to list its shares on NSE and BSE. Last week, the company said two bankers - ICICI Securities and Kotak Mahindra Capital - had exited from its public issue. However, the firm did not disclose any reason for their withdrawal, but reports suggest that this has happened over differences on pricing and timing of the IPO.

Now, the issue is being managed by SBI Capital Markets and Elara Capital India.

Infibeam plans to utilise the IPO proceeds towards setting up of cloud data centre and shifting and setting up of registered and corporate office of the company.

In addition, the funds will be used for setting up of 75 logistics centres, purchase of software and for other general corporate purposes.

So far this year, four firms - HealthCare Global Enterprises (HCG), Quick Heal Technologies, TeamLease Services and Precision Camshafts - have already hit the Dalal Street, while the IPO of Bharat Wire Ropes is currently underway.