EXCLUSIVE-Reliance Jio in talks with investors to sell 8% of individual stakes in IPO, sources say

By Kane Wu, Aditya Kalra and Vibhuti Sharma

HONG KONG/NEW DELHI, March 25 (Reuters) - Indian billionaire Mukesh Ambani's Reliance Jio Platforms has held talks with 13 marquee foreign investors to sell down 8% of individual stakes in an upcoming Mumbai listing of the telecoms-to-AI company, sources familiar with the matter said.

Ambani's ​Jio Platforms, which houses the world's second-largest telecom company by users after China Mobile 600941.SS, is set to file for approval of its IPO in Mumbai as early as this week.

Big investors on the list include Meta, with a stake of 9.99%, and Google, with 7.73%, followed by Vista Equity Partners and KKR. Three Gulf sovereign funds, the Public Investment Fund, Mubadala and Abu Dhabi Investment Authority are also investors.

The stake sale "would be around 8% for everyone," said one of the two sources involved in the IPO process, who spoke on condition of anonymity as the discussions were confidential.

KKR declined to comment, while Reliance and the other investors did not immediately respond to Reuters requests for comment.

Reuters calculations show each investors' sale of 8% of their holdings effectively implies about 2.5% of Reliance Jio's total outstanding shares offered in the listing, as it has planned.

Meta selling 8% of its 9.99% holding would mean a 0.8% stake sale by the U.S. tech giant, for example.

While the talks have focused on each investor selling 8% of its holding, the final numbers could still change.

The Reliance Jio IPO is being structured as an offer-for-sale, a common strategy in India where no new funds are raised by the companies and existing shareholders offload stakes, to be taken up by the public and other investors.

"Total stake sale will be 2.5% to 3%," said the second source aware of IPO plans. "Reliance wants to leave money on the table for retail investors and there is no decision yet on valuation of the company."

In 2020, Jio Platforms raised ​more than $20.5 billion from stake sales to foreign investors.

In November, investment bank Jefferies estimated Reliance Jio's valuation at $180 billion. Sources told Reuters in January the IPO could be worth as much as $4 billion, though final numbers will only be decided later.

Reliance Jio Platforms has hired 17 banks to manage its Mumbai stock listing.