Silver Lake and Facebook appear to be taking advantage of the current vibrancy in the Indian market. Barely a month after RBI lifted the ban on crypto in the country, high profile companies are developing interest on the sub-continent and the current target is the Jio Platforms owned by one of Indias richest businessman.
Silver Lake, a U.S. based equity and Investment Company and Facebook have shown interest in the Indian market. The U.S. outfit has pumped $746 million two weeks after Facebook invested $5.7 billion into a single company, Jio Platforms.
Interesting Silver Lake and Facebook investment
In a move seen to capitalize on the local market, the Silver Lake and Facebook investment comes at a time when the Indian banking industry is at its lowest while the crypto industry just got a boost from lifting of digital asset trading.
Silver Lake has the backing of high profile firms including Dell, Twitter, Alibaba and Airbnb. While making the announcement Monday, the firm’s valuate stake in Jio now stands at $65 billion. On its part, Jio boasts of a wide range of brands on top of having the largest mobile network, various Apps among other products.
A U.S. venture capital investor Vishal Gulati says:
It offers mobile internet at relatively low cost and tries to make money by up-selling subscriptions to its own versions of Spotify and Netflix.
The Jio mobile network prides of over 399 million subscribers already hooked to their 4G platform.
Silver Lake and Facebook are headed into different interest direction but the social network could be looking for support for its crypto inclined project Libra. After staking almost 10 percent on Jio, the investment became the social network’s second-largest investment after buying WhatsApp at $19 billion in 2014.
On its part, Silver Lake is seen as a strategic partner and will add technological value to Jio. The private equity firm is respected in technology and finance circles. This will help the Indian Digital Society leverage on technology and get a global voice.
While signing the deal, Silver Lake CEO Egon Durban added:
Jio Platforms is one of the world’s most remarkable companies, led by an incredibly strong and entrepreneurial management team who are driving and actualizing a courageous vision. The market potential they are addressing is enormous, and we are honored and pleased to have been invited to partner with Mukesh Ambani and the team at Reliance and Jio to help further the Jio mission.
