Companies
08/06/2024

It May Take Two Years Before Walmart's Flipkart, And PhonePe Go Public – Says Company Executive




According to a Walmart executive, it could take a several years for the Flipkart marketplace and PhonePe digital payments platform to make their initial public offerings.
 
Dan Bartlett, executive vice president for corporate affairs at Walmart, stated late on Thursday, "This is something we're looking at over the next couple of years," outside the company's shareholder meeting close to its Bentonville, Arkansas, headquarters.
 
Flipkart is a more established company, but Walmart could prioritise PhonePe's IPO above it, according to Bartlett, who spoke with Reuters.
 
He said that PhonePe, an Indian company, is "one of the largest payment platforms" in the nation. He mentioned PhonePe's connection to Unified Payments Interface (UPI), India's quick money transfer system that enables customers to move money between banks without revealing account information.
 
Referring to PhonePe, Bartlett stated, "There are a lot of processes that have to be put in place before we go public." He said, "Clearly, the question regarding the Indian exchange versus others" is "under consideration" for the upcoming initial public offering (IPO).
 
Strong growth may propel Walmart's Flipkart marketplace and PhonePe payments operations in India to $100 billion in revenue, the retailer's chief financial officer stated at an investor conference a year ago.
 
At the time, executives identified the two companies as critical contributors to Walmart's goal of doubling its gross merchandise volume sales in international markets to $200 billion in five years.
 
PhonePe said in October 2023 that more users were using its platform to send and receive money in India's burgeoning digital payments sector, which resulted in a 77% increase in the company's consolidated revenue for the 2023 fiscal year.
 
As of March 2023, PhonePe had over 490 million registered users and about 51 percent of the amount of transactions on India's UPI platform.
 
(Source:www.reuters.com)

Christopher J. Mitchell
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