NextBillion - An Initiative of the William Davidson Institute at the University of Michigan

By Manish Singh

Flipkart said on Monday it has raised $3.6 billion at a post-money valuation of $37.6 billion in what is widely believed to be the pre-IPO round for the Indian e-commerce conglomerate as it works to list in the public markets as soon as early next year.

The new round of funding — by far the largest for any Indian startup — was led by GIC, Canada Pension Plan Investment Board (CPP Investments), SoftBank Vision Fund 2 and Walmart, along with investments from sovereign funds DisruptAD, Qatar Investment Authority, Khazanah Nasional Berhad, Tencent, Willoughby Capital, Antara Capital, Franklin Templeton and Tiger Global.

The Monday investment marks the return of SoftBank as a shareholder of Flipkart. SoftBank, which had taken the exit from the startup when the Bangalore-based firm sold majority stakes to Walmart in 2018 at a valuation of $22 billion, has reinvested about $500 million in the new round.