Mukesh Ambani on Friday took another step in his inorganic growth path with Reliance Retail Ventures Ltd (RRVL) set to acquire a controlling stake in local search engine platform Just Dial Ltd for Rs 3,497 crore.
RRVL, which is the retail arm of Reliance Industries Ltd, on Friday executed definitive agreements with Just Dial and its founder V.S.S. Mani and others.
Consequently, Just Dial will make a preferential allotment of 2.11 crore equity shares to RRVL at Rs 1,022.25 apiece for Rs 2,165 crore.
Further, the RIL subsidiary will acquire 1.3 crore equity shares from Mani at Rs 1,020 apiece for Rs 1,332 crore.
It also intends to acquire up to 2.17 crore equity shares, representing 26 per cent in Just Dial, from its minority shareholders through an open offer for Rs 2,222 crore.
If the open offer is successful, the total consideration would rise to Rs 5,719 crore.
The preferential offer price of Rs 1,022.25 represents a discount of almost 5 per cent to the closing price of the Just Dial share on the BSE on Friday.
Sources close to RIL said the acquisition will help it in its B2B and B2C initiatives and is in synergy with some of its other buyouts such as UrbanLadder last year.
“Reliance is excited to partner Justdial and V.S.S. Mani, a first-generation entrepreneur, who has created a strong business through his business acumen and perseverance. The investment in Just Dial underlines our commitment to New Commerce by boosting the digital ecosystem for millions of our partner merchants, micro, small and medium enterprises. We look forward to working with the highly experienced management team of Just Dial as we expand the business going forward,” said Isha Ambani, director of RRVL.
A statement from RIL said V.S.S. Mani will continue as the managing director and chief executive officer to lead Just Dial through the next phase of growth. The company added that the capital infused by RRVL will help to drive the growth and expansion of Just Dial into a comprehensive local listing and commerce platform.
The investments are expected to benefit Just Dial’s existing database of around 30.4 million listings and its consumer traffic of around 129 million quarterly unique users as on March 2021.