Bennett, Coleman and Co. Ltd (BCCL) also known as Times Group acquires a small stake in India’s leading e-commerce firm Flipkart.
As per the Times of India acquisition strategy, Flipkart’s stake dilution to BCCL is for cash and advertising space in the latter’s media properties.
The story was first reported by Mint. Times group made a private investment about Rs 260 crore to buy a warrant for Class B equity shares in Flipkart as per the sourcing documents filed with the Registrar of Companies and from Tofler, a company research platform. The nature of the Flipkart-BCCL transaction is commonly known as a private treaty deal.
Rs 26 crore hard cash will be paid instantly to Flipkart, the rest of the amount will be paid when it converts the warrant into equity shares of Flipkart. BCCL and some other media firms have used this route to build a large portfolio of holdings. Started in 2004 by BCCL, such deals now have to meet mandated disclosure norms.
In February 2016, BCCL inked a similar deal with online marketplace Snapdeal (Jasper Infotech Pvt Ltd).
Globally, it also has investments in a large number of start-ups such as Uber Technologies Inc., services provider Haptik and education start-up Coursera, Mint reported. The private treaties are handled by BCCL’s Brand Capital unit. BCCL also owns digital properties such as real estate listings site magicbricks.com and music start-up Gaana.