CCI Approves GIC's Investment In IPO-Bound Groww

In the run up to Groww’s IPO, the Competition Commission of India (CCI) has approved Singapore’s sovereign wealth fund GIC’s stake acquisition in the fintech unicorn.

In a statement today, the CCI said it approved the proposal of GIC Ventures’ subsidiary Viggo Investment to buy a 2.14% stake in the investment tech major. The investor had sought the CCI’s approval for the transaction in May.

Last month, Groww’s board approved the allotment of 1.8 Cr Series F CCPS for INR 869 Cr and 1,000 equity shares to GIC for INR 96,560. Growwclosed the funding round raising $202.3 Mn (around INR 1,735 Cr) from GIC and ICONIQ Capital at a valuation of $7 Bn.

Pursuant to closing the Series F round, Groww took the confidential route to file its draft red herring prospectus (DRHP) with SEBI. Its IPO size is said to be around $700 Mn to $1 Bn, comprising a mix of a fresh issue and an offer-for-sale component.

Notably, the Singaporean sovereign wealth fund has been bullish about the Indian financial ecosystem for a while. Besides its investment in Groww, the investor has backed unicorns like Razorypay and CRED.

Further, the investor has invested $20 Bn in Indian banks, financial institutions, insurers and NBFCs like HDFC Bank, ICICI Bank, Bajaj Finance, SBI Life Insurance, among others, as per a report by ET.

In the case of Groww, GIC joins Peak XV Partners, Lone Pine Capital, Ribbit Capital, YC Continuity, Tiger Global, Propel Venture Partners, among others, on the fintech startup’s cap table. Groww has raised a funding of about $600 Mn to date.

Founded by Lalit Keshre, Harsh Jain, Neeraj Singh and Ishan Bansal, Groww provides an online investment platform to invest in stocks, mutual funds, IPOs, ETFs, and digital gold. The startup is the biggest brokerage in the country with a user base of over 1.5 Cr users across 900+ cities in India.

Groww turned profitable in FY21 and gained a valuation of $3 Bn in 2021. Since then, its valuation has grown to $7 Bn after multiple years of profitability.

In FY25, the startup is reported to have posted a net profit of INR 1,819 Cr, a 3X increase from INR 535 Cr in FY24. Meanwhile, its revenue jumped 31% to INR 4,056 Cr, from INR 3,145 Cr in FY24.

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