IPO-bound Meesho to finalise India flip back in coming days

Vidit Aatrey, co-founder and CEO, Meesho

E-commerce startup Meesho has reached advanced stages to redomicile its base back to India, from Delaware in the United States, and the process is expected to be complete over the next few days, in the run up to its $1 billion initial public offering (IPO), sources told Moneycontrol.

Flipping its headquarters back to India is the last step for IPO-bound Meesho before it proceeds to file its draft red herring prospectus (DRHP) with the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI).

"Once the flip back is confirmed, the DRHP can be expected in a few weeks," one of the sources cited above said.

Earlier this week, Meesho converted into a public company to firm up its IPO plans. The Bengaluru-based company is expected to raise as much as $1 billion through an IPO, Moneycontrol had exclusively reported.

It even picked bankers for its IPO, where it is likely to command a valuation of $10 billion, a multi-fold jump from $4 billion earlier.

Meesho did not immediately reply to Moneycontrol’s queries.

If Meesho lists on the bourses this year, it would have outpaced arch rival Walmart-owned Flipkart, an old and dominant player in the space. Flipkart, started in 2007, is preparing for a market debut, too, and waiting for its parent, the US retail giant, to decide on a timeline for its IPO.

The company was founded in 2015 by IIT-Delhi alumni Vidit Aatrey and Sanjeev Barnwal and has raised over $1.3 billion in capital from Tiger Global, SoftBank, Elevation Capital and several others.