The board of Le Travenues Technology, the parent of online travel aggregator Ixigo, has approved a primary investment of Rs 1,295 crore by Dutch investment firm Prosus (MIH Investments One B.V.) for a 10.1% stake in the company.
The investment, through a preferential issue at Rs 280 per share, is subject to shareholder approval, Ixigo said in a stock exchange filing on Friday.
Le Travenues Technology plans to use the funds to support organic as well as inorganic opportunities, working capital requirements, and for general corporate purposes. It plans to allocate an equal share of the funds towards each of the specified purposes.
“Given the critical mass of organic users we have, judicious investments every year can help us build brand recall in categories such as flights and buses and we want to keep some optionality for making future acquisitions and strategic investments,” the company said.
Prosus’ portfolio spans sectors such as ecommerce, food delivery, travel, payments and fintech. In the travel sector, Naspers, the majority owner of Prosus, had earlier backed Goibibo. Following Goibibo’s acquisition by rival MakeMyTrip in 2017, Naspers gained a stake in the latter through a share swap.
In 2019, Trip.com (then known as Ctrip) acquired Naspers’ 42% stake in MakeMyTrip, leaving Naspers with a 5.6% holding in the Chinese travel aggregator as part of the deal. The investment firm fully exited Trip.com last year.
This May, Prosus acquired Latin American online travel agency Despegar.
Shares of Le Travenues Technology, which listed in June last year at Rs 93, were trading at Rs 312 as of Friday morning. The company’s market capitalisation currently stands at Rs 11,211 crore.
Last month, global investor Schroder International Selection Fund increased its stake in Le Travenues to 7.18% by acquiring 41,638 shares for an estimated Rs 1.13 crore. It had earlier acquired 5.36 million shares in June for Rs 96.9 crore.
Founded in 2007 by Aloke Bajpai and Rajnish Kumar, Ixigo allows users to book train, flight, and bus tickets while offering various utility tools and services such as train PNR status, as well as confirmation predictions and updates on train seat availability.
Ixigo posted a net profit of Rs 19 crore for the quarter ended June 30, a 27% jump from a year earlier. Operating revenue surged 73% to Rs 314 crore on account of growth across all lines of business, effective cross-selling and upselling to its user base, as well as artificial intelligence-driven efficiency.
