Singapore state investment firm Temasek Holdings has announced an investment of $162.5 million (Rs 1,245 crore) in three funds owned and managed by Info Edge (India) Ltd, which owns and operates portals such as job site Naukri.com and real estate broking platform 99acres.com.
“MacRitchie Investments Pte. Ltd, an indirect wholly owned subsidiary of Temasek Holdings (Pvt.) Limited has committed approximately 50% of total corpus of each scheme in partnership with the company, sponsored through Smartweb Internet Services Limited,” publicly-listed Info Edge said in a regulatory filing on stock exchanges.
Smartweb Internet Services is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Info Edge.
Info Edge previously onboarded Temasek Holdings as an anchor for its debut venture fund in late 2020.
The Temasek arm will invest $50 million (around Rs 383 crore) in the second scheme of Info Edge Venture Fund (IEVF), follow on of fund I; $75 million (Rs 575 crore) in Info Edge Capital’s IE Venture Investment Fund II and $37.5 million (Rs 287 crore) in Capital 2B Fund I, which is awaiting regulatory approval.
The remaining 50% of the contribution will come from Info Edge, directly or through its wholly-owned subsidiaries and is subject to shareholder approval that is underway ending on May 21.
The first fund, which raised around Rs 750 crore ($100 million), has made investments in DotPe, a payments company set up by PayU India co-founder; Qyuki, a venture co-founded by music composer AR Rahman; Fanclash, an e-sports community engagement platform and Truemeds, a telehealth platform.
Mumbai-based Info Edge, which started Naukri.com in 1997, operates a slew of internet properties, including real estate portal 99acres.com, matrimonial website Jeevansathi and education services portal Shiksha.
An active investor in startups, Info Edge became an early shareholder in recently-gone-public food delivery aggregator Zomato and unicorn insurance aggregator PolicyBazaar. Its other bets include edtech ventures NoPaperForms, Adda 247, Meritnation; business-to-business e-commerce platform ShopKirana; agritech firm Gramaphone; healthtech platforms Medcords, and AR Rahman co-founded Qyuki.
Recently, Info Edge acquired 76% stake in Bengaluru-based dating app Aisle for Rs 91 crore (around $11.8 million). This week it invested in Noida-based rural vehicle marketplace Tractor.
Info Edge employs around 5,000 people and operates through 64 offices across 45 India cities and other overseas offices in Dubai, Riyadh, Abu Dhabi, Qatar and Bahrain focused on the Middle East market.
The company also owns Quadrangle – an offline executive search business, and Naukri Gulf, one of the leading job sites in the Middle East market.
