Tolan raises $30 million for AI companion app
Union Square Ventures, Khosla Ventures and Homebrew participated in the round, which doubled the startup’s total funding, according to a media report.
Jio draws over $25 billion in anchor demand for $3.2 billion IPO
BlackRock, Fidelity and Abu Dhabi Investment Authority were among the bidders, Reliance said, as Jio began its institutional offering.
Demand from anchor investors for Jio Platforms’ $3.2 billion IPO exceeded $25 billion, two sources said. The Indian telecom, cloud and AI group began accepting institutional bids on October 19, before opening the offering to public subscriptions.
Reliance identified Fidelity, Abu Dhabi Investment Authority and BlackRock among the bidders. A filing showed that anchor investors received share allocations worth more than 81 billion rupees ($853.31 million). Recipients also included HDFC Bank, JPMorgan, Life Insurance Corporation and BNP Paribas.
One source said bids amounted to more than 30 times the anchor quota. The portion reserved exclusively for institutional investors represents up to 30% of the offering.
Jio intends to direct up to 275 billion Indian rupees ($2.90 billion) of net proceeds toward debt repayment or prepayment at Reliance Jio Infocomm, its telecom subsidiary. The IPO will be Reliance’s first since Reliance Petroleum’s listing in 2006.
Akash Ambani, Mukesh Ambani’s son, leads Jio, which runs the telecom and digital operations of Reliance Industries. Its mobile business serves more than 500 million subscribers, competing with Vodafone Idea and Bharti Airtel. Its operations also cover fixed broadband, entertainment, cloud, enterprise technology and AI.
The offering comes after the National Stock Exchange of India listed in September. LSEG figures put Indian IPO proceeds at $12.65 billion for the year to date, an 8.3% increase from the corresponding period a year earlier.