Non-resident 'Indpreneurs' hit Deal St

NEW DELHI: Ever heard of Subrah Iyar, Rattan Chadha, Kirit Pathak, Jagdev Singh Gill or Vikrant Bhargava? Most likely not. When Sabeer Bhatia sold Hotmail to Microsoft in a $400-million deal 10 years ago, it set a benchmark that was hard to match for NRI entrepreneurs, especially after the dotcom bubble burst.

However, at a time when India Inc is going all out sewing global M&As, a new breed of NRIs is spinning $100-million-plus deals selling their business babies. And guess what, barring a few exceptions, the rest have nothing to do with the Net.

The latest and the biggest headline-grabber came last month when Cisco announced a takeover of WebEx Communications, a Nasdaq-listed Web conferencing company. The $3.2-billion deal translates into a cool $215-million windfall for Subrah Iyar, the co-founder who is cashing out 7.4% stake.

He is not alone. Other NRIs too have been striking equally-lucrative deals for the fruits of their labour and, need we say, brain power. Perhaps the biggest multibagger of them all is Rattan Chadha. The little-known Holland-based businessman is the brain behind clothing empire Mexx. He sold Mexx in a $266-million deal to Liz Claiborne in 2001 and finally stepped down as the CEO of Mexx last December.

Even as Chadha was busy building his clothing-cum-retail business in Europe, another NRI family was doing something similar in Asia. The Gills, who announced last month that they are selling their Singapore-based sports and lifestyle marketer and retailer RSH, also known as Royal Sporting House, stand to gain close to $111 million.

Incidentally, the acquirers of RSH happen to be led by another Indian business house. Golden Ace, the company that has made a conditional offer to acquire a majority stake in the Singapore-listed company, is a 70:30 joint venture between Shravan Gupta-promoted MGF and Dubai-based Emaar.

Then there is the UK-based Kirit Pathak. While the chairman and CEO of Patak’s, the popular curry brand, has stated that he is not looking at an outright selloff, given the $400-million valuation being talked about, even a minority stake dilution of 25% to a strategic investor would spin into a $100-million deal. According to news reports, the suitors include Unilever, Heinz and ITC. That’s not the end. There are many who have turned multi-millionaires abroad by selling a part of what they started or co-founded.

Take Vikrant Bhargava of PartyGaming. The Gibraltar-based former CEO of PartyGaming has, reportedly, sold off about 4% stake in the online gambling company for $100 million early this year. This is despite the valuation meltdown of PartyGaming after a US ban on online gambling sites last September. Even after all the big-ticket deals, the Hotmail guy continues to hold the record for the biggest deal struck by an NRI entrepreneur abroad.

However, as the single-largest shareholder of PartyGaming, Anurag Dikshit is still sitting with 29% stake in the company — and this is one benchmark that may not stand up for too long. Dikshit’s stake is currently valued at a staggering $1.2 billion.