Jhunjhunwala-backed Baazar Style Retail raises Rs 37 crore in pre-IPO placement

Rakesh Rekha Jhunjhunwala-backed Baazar Style Retail has raised Rs 37 crore in a pre-IPO placement from institutional investors including Volrado Ventures Partners Fund II. In consultation with lead managers to the issue, the company had undertaken a private placement of 9,56,072 shares to Rs 387 apiece as per a media advertisement on Monday, August 05.
 

With the latest tranche of fund raising, IPO-bound player has trimmed its fresh issue size to Rs 148 crore from Rs 185 crore. The Kolkata-based Baazar Style Retail is a value fashion retailer with the largest retail footprint in Eastern India. The company claims to have leadership position in West Bengal and Odisha's organized value retail market.
 

As per the DRHP of the company, seasoned Dalal Street investor Rekha Rakesh Jhunjhuwala is looking to offload 27,23,120 equity shares in the IPO. She owned 54,46,240 equity shares or 7.8 per cent stake in the company, the DRHP of the company suggested.
 

According to the DRHP filed in March 2024, the public issue with a face value of Rs 5 per equity share is a mix of a fresh issue of up to Rs 185 crore and an offer of sale of up to 16.88 million by the promoter group and other selling shareholders. The offer includes a reservation for subscriptions by eligible employees.
 

Baazar Style Retail was incorporated in 2014 and has scaled itself to 153 stores spread across over 1.39 million square feet located in 140 cities in 9 states as of 31 December, 2023. It is the fastest growing value retailer between 2017 to 2023, in terms of both store count and revenue from operations, with the highest Ebitda margin for FY23, said a Technopak report.
 

It has developed its brand ‘Style Bazaar’ over the years, through a wide range of products, which has resulted in strong customer loyalty and recognition. Axis Capital, Intensive Fiscal Services, and JM Financial are the book-running lead managers, and Link Intime India is the registrar of the issue.