Prosus NV, the Dutch unit of Naspers Ltd, has acquired Indian fee companies supplier BillDesk for $4.7 billion in money in its largest acquisition.
The Amsterdam-based firm’s PayU unit agreed to purchase BillDesk to create an organization that can deal with a complete transaction quantity (TPV) of $147 billion in India. The acquisition may even give PayU entry to BillDesk’s massive buyer base of small retailers in India.
On finishing the transaction, Prosus’s cumulative funding in India will practically double to greater than $10 billion.
The deal is the second-largest inbound acquisition within the tech area after Walmart Inc.’s acquisition of Flipkart for $16 billion in 2018. It’s additionally the most important acquisition in India’s fintech sector.
Prosus has been strengthening its place in India’s funds trade by way of PayU India. BillDesk marks PayU’s fourth acquisition within the final 5 years after it snapped up funds know-how firm CitrusPay in 2016 for $160 million.
It then acquired digital credit score platform Paysense in 2020 for $185 million, which now powers its shopper lending aspirations in India.
“The acquisition cements our place because the main funds supplier in India and is the sturdy instance of the ecosystem we’re constructing to serve numerous communities,” Bob van Dijk, group chief govt officer of Prosus, mentioned in a convention name with reporters on Tuesday.
Prosus’s newest funding is anticipated to offer exits to founders who personal 30.84% in BillDesk together with key buyers, together with Common Atlantic, TA Associates, Temasek and Clearstone.
The transaction, topic to approval from the Competitors Fee of India (CCI), is anticipated to shut by the primary half of 2022.
BillDesk, based in 2000 by M.N. Srinivasu, Ajay Kaushal and Karthik Ganapathy, has raised greater than $240 million so far and was final valued at $1.8 billion in 2018.
BillDesk founders will proceed with the agency.
The BillDesk acquisition will make PayU one of many largest gamers in India’s fintech fee ecosystem.
As well as, it can present PayU entry to BillDesk’s massive service provider base, as the previous seems to be to cross-sell merchandise, together with enterprise lending.
Prosus has invested near $6 billion in India and backed a number of corporations, together with on-line classifieds platform OLX, on-line tutoring firm Byju’s, meals supply service supplier Swiggy, and e-commerce large Flipkart.
Whereas PayU largely powers on-line funds for e-commerce corporations, BillDesk’s power lies within the invoice funds and small service provider ecosystem.
Collectively, the 2 count on to create a monetary ecosystem dealing with 4 billion transactions yearly, 4 instances what PayU processes in India.
Funds for home and cross border transactions is without doubt one of the main income items for PayU globally.