Private equity inflows jump 118% in H1 to $11.82 billion

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Private equity investment inflows to domestic firms soared two-fold in the first half (H1) of 2021 to $11.82 billion over the year-ago period when the whole world was under lockdowns due to the first wave of the killer virus, show industry data. Fund inflows jumped over 77% in the second quarter of 2021 to $7.55 billion compared to $4.26 billion in the first quarter, according to the data collated by Refinitiv, the London Stock Exchange Group’s financial markets data and insights arm. However, volume growth was a tepid 8.8% in Q2 at 296 transactions up from 272 in Q1, totalling the counts in the first half to 568, against 365 transactions in the year-ago period. Total inflows in the first half of 2020 were $5.43 billion across 365 deals, while in the first quarter these were $3.92 billion across 183 deals and the second quarter at $1.51 billion across 182 deals, according to Refinitiv.

The whole of 2020 saw a whopping $34.96 billion flowing into 708 domestic companies which was the highest on record, while it was only $15.31 billion in 2019. The top ten deals of the first half of 2021 are: Think & Learn ($1.32 billion), Bundl Technologies ($800 million), Mohalla Tech $502 million), Sporta Technologies ($355.6 million), Axelia Solutions ($350 million), Brainbees Solutions ($315 million), Zomato ($302 million), Meesho Payments ($300 million), Pine Labs ($285 million), and Dreamplug Technologies ($272.11 million), according to Refinitiv. Over 40% of the total inflows were into the online space worth $4.52 billion in H1, up over 73%  y-o-y, across 210 deals (vs 149 y-o-y), followed by financials. Investments into the online sector have increased 73.2%, with the number of deals rising from 149 in H1 of 2020 to 201 in H1 of 2021. Fund flows into software companies rose 261%, financial services rose 44%, medical health and consumer related companies by 64% each. However, there was a steep decline in fundraising in the country during the reporting period.