Reliance Jio Announces 7th Deal in 6 Weeks, Silver Lake to Invest Additional Rs 4,546.80 Cr for Total 2.08% Stake

Reliance Industries Limited (RIL) on Friday said American private equity giant Silver Lake and co-investors will invest an additional Rs 4,546.80 crore in Jio Platforms for a total equity stake of 2.08 per cent.

The aggregate investment by Silver Lake now stands at Rs 10,202.55 crore. The private equity giant had on May 4 bought one per cent of Jio Platforms for $750 million (Rs 5,655.75 crore).

This will be the seventh investment in RIL in quick succession following those by social media major Facebook, sovereign fund Mubadala, Vista Equity Partners, KKR & Co Inc, and General Atlantic.

Over the past six weeks, the digital business of Reliance Industries Ltd, known as Jio Platforms, has raised a striking Rs 92,202.15 crore from global investors for a total 19.9 per cent stake.

Earlier on Friday, RIL announced that Mubadala Investment Company, the Abu Dhabi-based sovereign investor, will invest Rs 9,093.60 crore in Jio Platforms for a 1.85 percent equity stake on a fully diluted basis.

Silver Lake shot into prominence after acquiring PC maker Dell Inc along with Michael Dell in 2013. It is a global leader in technology investing, with over $43 billion in combined assets under management and committed capital and a team of approximately 100 investment and operating professionals located around the world in Silicon Valley, New York, Hong Kong and London.

Silver Lake has earlier invested in Twitter, Airbnb, Alibaba, Dell Technologies, ANT Financials, Twitter, Alphabet’s Waymo and Verily among others.

RIL on May 22 announced had that private equity firm KKR will invest Rs 11,367 crore in Jio Platforms for a 2.32 per cent stake.

The RIL unit comprises mostly its telecom business under Reliance Jio Infocomm, which is the largest in the country with more than 388 million subscribers.

Prior to this, General Atlantic on May 18 said it will buy 1.34 per cent stake in Jio Platforms for Rs 6,598.38 crore, while Vista Equity Partners said on May 8 it will be picking up a 2.32 per cent stake for Rs 11,367 crore.

RIL on Wednesday also closed a $7 billion rights issue, India's largest ever, luring buyers in with a rare deferred payment offer. Proceeds from the issue, also ranked as one of the world's largest by a non-financial company based on Dealogic data, will aid Reliance's plan to slash net debt to zero this year.

The issue was subscribed about 1.6 times, in "a vote of confidence, by both domestic investors, foreign investors and small retail shareholders, in the intrinsic strength of the Indian economy", chairman and managing director Mukesh Ambani said in a statement on Wednesday.

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