China's Tencent Buys $264 Million Stake In Flipkart From Binny Bansal

Chinese technology conglomerate Tencent has bought a stake worth $264 million (about Rs 2,060 crore) in Flipkart from its co-founder, Binny Bansal, through its European subsidiary, according to official documents.

Singapore-headquartered e-commerce firm Flipkart has operations in India only.

Mr Bansal holds around a 1.84 per cent stake in Flipkart after selling part of his stake to Tencent Cloud Europe BV.

The transaction was completed on October 26, 2021, and was shared with the government authorities at the beginning of the current financial year.

Post the transaction, the Tencent arm holds 0.72 per stake in Flipkart, valued at around $264 million, as per the last valuation of $37.6 billion disclosed by the e-commerce firm in July 2021.

The company's valuation surged to $37.6 billion after raising $3.6 billion (about Rs 26,805.6 crore) in a funding round led by Singapore's sovereign wealth fund GIC, CPP Investments, SoftBank Vision Fund 2 and Walmart.

Disrupt, Qatar Investment Authority, Khazanah Nasional Berhad, and marquee investors Tencent, Willoughby Capital, Antara Capital, Franklin Templeton and Tiger Global also participated in the funding round.

The transaction between Bansal and Tencent took place after the July funding round.

Sources said the transaction took place in Singapore. Still, Flipkart informed Indian authorities about it as a responsible entity and that the transaction does not fall under the purview of 'Press Note 3', which calls for scrutiny of investment that any Indian company gets from countries sharing a land border with India.

While several companies are operating in India in which Tencent has invested, the government has banned some gaming apps, including PUBG Mobile and PUBG Mobile Lite, published by Tencent Group.

An E-mail query sent to Flipkart and Bansal did not elicit any reply.