‘India’s diversity to bring Meesho-like outcomes across sectors’

on wednesday, Meesho’s share price ended its listing day at: ₹170.45 on the National Stock Exchange, a 53.6% premium over the initial public offering (IPO) price. ₹111. The company gained over 1% in market capitalization on Thursday. ₹ 75,942 crore or $8 billion.

Prosus, which owns an 11.2% stake in the mass-market online retailer, struck gold. The company, which has a reputation for having constant capital, is in no rush to sell.

It all started with a cold email sent to the founders of Meesho. “I had heard of them and wanted to meet them. I met them in early 2018 and was impressed with the business they had built,” said Ashutosh Sharma, president of Prosus India Ecosysem. his firm He first invested in Meesho, then a reseller, in 2019. Prosus then followed up by participating in Meesho’s funding rounds in 2019 and 2024.

Prosus helped the company transform from a social commerce firm to a high-scale e-commerce firm. “Over a period of time, what we became more and more convinced of was the strategic vision of this team to solve commerce for the next 300-500 million users, and they kept taking the right calls to deliver that, which meant going direct-to-consumer, moving from a WhatsApp, and I wouldn’t even call it a pivot,” said Saurav Jain, lead investor, India Ecosystem, Prosus. Saurav Jain is the lead investor in Prosus’ India Ecosystem. “It was more of a vertical catering service to the same target group, but instead of going through the franchise model, it was going directly to them.”

This gives the company the confidence to continue its investments. “We did not want to sell on Meesho. We did some (selling through offer for sale in IPO) just to meet regulatory requirements,” said Sharma.

IPO line

In the last 12-18 months alone, the firm has seen four of its key portfolio companies including Swiggy, Bluestone, Urban Company and Meesho listed on Indian stock exchanges. At Thursday’s closing, the company’s earnings are expected to be $3.95 billion. Like other companies Rapido, PayU, Vastu Housing, Minitfi and Captain Fresh are also planning IPOs in the next 12-18 months. Prosus has approximately 32 companies in its India portfolio.

Sharma is confident that his company’s recent success will be seen in other companies as well. “I am very, very hopeful. The reason for this is simple. India is so heterogeneous that you can make a product specific to a particular group of people. I think this allows a lot of new companies to thrive and launch a product with a strong product market that suits this sub-segment of society. So India’s heterogeneity allows many different companies to co-exist,” said Sharma. It will create “Meesho-like results” across all sectors.

Even though it is ready for harvest, Prosus is busy deploying capital to India. In early August, next-generation travel services company Ixigo brought in $146 million in revenue, a first for the company. In this calendar year alone, the firm has distributed around $675 million in India to companies like Urban Company, PayU, Rapido, Ixigo, Wiom, Deccan AI, Codekarma and Arivihan.

In an interview with Mint In May, Prosus chief executive Fabricio Bloisi said his company was considering reorganizing its business by focusing on three key regions, including India.

“India is a very important market for us as Prosus. In fact, this is our second biggest focus,” Bloisi said. The company plans to narrow its geographic focus to Latin America, Europe and India. “We will invest many more billions of dollars in India in the near future,” he had said.