Tech Craze Helps Indian IPO to Best Debut in Nearly a Year
Happiest Minds’ debut is the best since October, when IRCTC surged 127% on the first day of trading.
(Bloomberg) -- Happiest Minds Technologies Ltd. more than doubled on the first day of trading after the technology company last week closed one of India’s most successful initial share sales of this decade.
Demand exceeded shares on offer by 151 times as retail investors piled into a company that gets almost all its revenue from digital services. The founder and Chief Executive Officer Ashok Soota’s storied career in the technology industry, including the IPO of Mindtree Ltd., also helped drum up interest for nine-year-old Happiest Minds.
The Bengaluru-based company’s stock began trading at 351 rupees versus an offer price of 166 rupees, and climbed as high as 395 rupees in early trade. The debut is the best since October, when state-owned Indian Railway Catering & Tourism Corp. surged 127% on listing.
Key Insights
- Happiest Minds gets 97% of its sales from digital services including cloud computing, infrastructure, networking, data analytics, and other support services.
- Indian software exporters’ shares have delivered the highest returns in 2020 after healthcare firms, gaining 28% this year. That’s the second-best performance among 19 sub-indexes compiled by BSE Ltd.
- “Investors are looking to get as much exposure to technology and IT services as they can,” said Deven Choksey, who oversees investment and research at KR Choksey Investment Managers Pvt. “After hitting portfolio limits on stocks like Infosys Ltd., a company like Happiest Minds is the best way to do it.”
- Happiest Minds was followed by an IPO from Route Mobile Ltd., a cloud-communication service provider. That sale was oversubscribed more than 73 times last week.
Market Reaction
- Happiest Minds’ shares surged 123% over the offer price to 371 rupees at the 3:30 p.m. close in Mumbai.
- Here are some of the top gainers among mainboard IPOs over the past three years
| Company | Offer Price (Rs.) | Debut Gains (%) |
|---|---|---|
| IRCTC | 320 | 127 |
| Avenue Supermarts | 299 | 114 |
| Central Depository | 149 | 75 |
| HDFC AMC | 1,100 | 65 |
| Dixon Technologies | 1,766 | 64 |
| CSB Bank | 195 | 54 |
| AU Small Finance Bank | 358 | 51 |
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- Happiest Minds’ float marks a revival in India’s IPO pipeline, which had gone quiet during the pandemic
- It’s also the second time that 77-year old Soota is leading a company to a successful trading debut. His previous startup, Mindtree, went public in March 2007. That IPO was oversubscribed over 100 times.
- The rush for new technology companies mirrors the appetite among global investors to hunt out the next Zoom Video Communications Inc.
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