Jio seeks to raise up to $3.2 billion in India’s biggest IPO

Jio Platforms, the digital arm of Reliance Industries, is seeking to raise as much as $3.2 billion in an initial public offering that could become India’s biggest. The listing will test public-market appetite for a company that attracted more than $20 billion from global investors, including Google and Meta, in 2020.

Reliance Industries said in a Wednesday stock exchange filing that Jio set a price band of ₹1,065 to ₹1,119 per share, or about $11.19 to $11.76, for up to 270 million new shares. The offering is scheduled to open on October 21 and close on October 23; bidding for anchor investors is set for October 19.

At the top of the proposed range, the offering would value Jio at about ₹10.3 trillion, or around $108.3 billion, based on the expected share count after the IPO. Jio was valued at up to ₹4.91 trillion, about $65 billion at the time, in 2020. Meta, then known as Facebook, invested $5.7 billion, and Google committed $4.5 billion.

The IPO would surpass Hyundai Motor India’s ₹278.7 billion offering in 2024, worth $3.3 billion at the time, even if Jio shares are priced at the bottom of the range. Jio had more than 524 million subscribers as of March 31 and has expanded beyond telecom into broadband, cloud services and other digital businesses.

According to its prospectus, Jio plans to use up to ₹275 billion, about $2.9 billion, of the proceeds to repay debt at subsidiary Reliance Jio Infocomm. The remaining proceeds are earmarked for general corporate purposes. The prospectus also reports that revenue in the quarter ended June rose nearly 12% year over year to ₹391.7 billion, while net profit increased 9% to ₹77.6 billion.

TechCrunch reports that the IPO could be India’s biggest; the company’s final proceeds and valuation depend on the offering terms.