Flush with Unicorns, india’s tech moment arrives

Tech startups in India were having a watershed moment with a record bout of fundraising: food-delivery app Zomato Ltd. became its first unicorn to debut on the stock-market. — REUTERS/Francis Mascarenhas

Last week marked a watershed for technology startups in India, as a record bout of fundraising shifted attention to the world’s second-most populous market, just as investors were becoming spooked by a crackdown on internet companies in China.

Food-delivery app Zomato Ltd. became the nation’s first unicorn to make its stock-market debut, raising US$1.3bil (RM5.48bil) with backing from Morgan Stanley, Tiger Global and Fidelity Investments.

The parent of digital payments startup Paytm filed a draft prospectus for what could be India’s biggest IPO at US$2.2bil (RM9.28bil), while retailer Flipkart Online Services Pvt raised US$3.6bil (RM15.18bil) at a US$38bil (RM160.23bil) valuation, a record funding round for an Indian startup.