FirstCry raises $227 Mn from anchor investors ahead of IPO

BrainBees Solutions Limited, the parent company of FirstCry, has offered Rs 1,886 crore (approximately $227 million) worth of shares to 71 anchor investors as part of its initial public offering.

The board at FirstCry has passed a resolution to offer 4,05,55,428 equity shares at an issue price of Rs 465 each (upper-band) to its anchor investors, as per data sourced from Bombay Stock Exchange shows.

SBI, Fidelity, Goldman Sachs, ICICI, HDFC, Kotak, Bajaj Allianz, Steadview, Morgan Stanley, and Max Life are some key anchor investors in Firstcry’s IPO.

FirstCry will initiate its public offering from August 6 to August 8 with a price band of Rs 440-465 with a minimum bid quantity of 32 shares.

Before the anchor investment round, SoftBank was the largest shareholder in FirstCry with a 25.53% stake followed by Mahindra & Mahindra and Premji Invest which owned 10.97% and 10.36%, respectively. The company’s founder Supam Maheshwari has 6% of the firm while the entire ESOP pool formed 8.4% of the cap table.

FirstCry demonstrated humble growth during the last fiscal year but it narrowed down losses by more than one-third. Its operating revenue increased by 15% to Rs 6,481 crore whereas its losses 34% to Rs 321 crore in FY24 with an improved EBITDA margin in the last fiscal year (FY24).

As per the company’s DRHP, FirstCry had 1,018 offline stores across the country out of which 632 were franchise-owned while remaining owned by the company until the end of the last calendar year (2023).