Lenskart Raises ₹3,268 Crore from Anchor Investors Ahead of IPO

Lenskart Solutions Limited, one of India’s largest omni-channel eyewear retailers, offering a wide range of affordable and fashionable prescription eyeglasses, sunglasses, and contact lenses through its online platform and extensive retail network, has allotted 8,13,02,412 equity shares to anchor investors, comprising marquee domestic and global institutional investors, and raised ₹3,268.36 crore ahead of the Company’s proposed IPO at the upper end of the price band at ₹402 per equity share (face value ₹2 per share).

Out of the total allocation of 8.13 crore equity shares to anchor investors, 2.87 crore equity shares (35.34%) were allocated to 21 domestic mutual funds through a total of 59 schemes.

The anchor book has received widespread participation from domestic institutional investors including leading mutual funds such as SBI Mutual Fund, HDFC Mutual Fund, ICICI Prudential Mutual Fund, Kotak Mutual Fund, Axis Mutual Fund, Aditya Birla Sun Life Mutual Fund, Mirae Asset, DSP Mutual Fund, Franklin India, HSBC MF, WhiteOak Capital, Edelweiss, Bandhan, and Canara Robeco, and insurance companies such as SBI Life Insurance, HDFC Life Insurance, ICICI Prudential Life Insurance, Bajaj Allianz Life Insurance, Kotak Mahindra Life Insurance, Axis Max Life, Reliance Nippon Life Insurance, and Tata AIA Life Insurance.

Global interest was equally notable with very strong demand from sovereign and long-only FIIs such as the Government of Singapore, Monetary Authority of Singapore, Government Pension Fund Global (Norway), New World Fund Inc, Fidelity, T. Rowe Price, BlackRock, Capital Group, Goldman Sachs, Nomura, Amundi, JP Morgan and Wellington Management Company LLP, among others.

The offer comprises a fresh issue of equity shares aggregating up to ₹21,500 million (the “fresh issue”) and an offer for sale of up to 127,562,573 equity shares by certain existing shareholders, including Peyush Bansal, Neha Bansal, Amit Chaudhary and Sumeet Kapahi (“Promoter Selling Shareholders”) and SVF II Lightbulb (Cayman) Limited, Schroders Capital Private Equity Asia Mauritius Limited, PI Opportunities Fund – II, MacRitchie Investments Pte. Ltd., Kedaara Capital Fund II LLP, and Alpha Wave Ventures LP (“Investor Selling Shareholders”). The Offer comprises of an Employee Reservation Portion aggregating up to ₹150 million with the balance offer size being called as the “Net Offer”.

The company plans to utilise the net proceeds from the IPO for setting up new company-owned, company-operated (CoCo) stores in India, lease and rental payments, technology and cloud infrastructure, brand marketing, inorganic acquisitions, and general corporate purposes.

Kotak Mahindra Capital Company Limited, Morgan Stanley India Company Private Limited, Avendus Capital Private Limited, Citigroup Global Markets India Private Limited, Axis Capital Limited, and Intensive Fiscal Services Private Limited are the Book Running Lead Managers (“BRLMs”) to the issue.