Paytm-Freecharge deal may still happen

Paytm-Freecharge deal is not over yet. Paytm had offered a term-sheet to Freecharge and has been waiting to hear back from the latter, said Vijay Shekhar Sharma talking to CNBC TV-18.

In May, Paytm had signed a non-exclusive term sheet to acquire rival FreeCharge.

The company’s interest in Freecharge is based on the fact it offers a huge customer base and opens a great opportunity for Paytm to expand its customer base to another few millions at one go.

Sharma added that Paytm-Freecharge talk is in the midst of process and he has also made a formal offer to Freecharge and is waiting for its competitor to revert on this.

According to media reports, Freecharge was expecting the deal size to be in the bracket of $70 million to $90 million. This was a sharp decline considering Snapdeal paid a price of $400 million in April 2015, to acquire the online wallet.

In April, Freecharge was estimated to have recorded Rs 300 crore in transaction revenue, and about 12 million in volume.

In the same month, Paytm had done 255 million transactions, running close to 10 million transactions a day. The company said that it also closed fiscal 2017 with three-fold growth in total transactions to 1.5 billion. The company has around 218 million wallet users.

Earlier, media reports have also confirmed that Freecharge is also in talks with probable buyers – Bank of Baroda and Times Internet.

Negotiations were on to ensure that the 200-250 employees of FreeCharge are also absorbed by the firm that acquires the company.

In 2016, Bank of Baroda launched its own mobile wallet M-Clip. For Bank of Borada, Freecharge acquisition will allow the bank to expand the mobile wallet service it launched last year and also get access to millions of millennial customers Freecharge has on its platform.

For Times Internet, Freecharge deal will help the company to integrate Freecharge with its properties – Indiatimes shopping, Cricbuzz and Gaana.