Reliance Jio raises over ₹1.68 lakh in 58 days; becomes debt-free

The Reliance Jio deal spree began on April 22, 2020, with Facebook investing ₹43,573.62 crores in Jio Platform for a 9.99% stake in the firm. This was followed by a chain of investments by global investors that includes ADIA, General Atlantic, KKR, Silver Lake, Vista Equity Partners, Mubadala, TPG, L Catterton and PIF. The investments made by these companies sum up to ₹115,693.95 crores of the capital raised by RIL and a 24.70% stake acquired by these investors in Jio Platforms.

Through RIL rights issue, Reliance Jio also raised ₹53,124.20 crores from May 20, 2020, to June 3, 2020. The global investments combined with the RIL rights issue account for an aggregate amount of ₹168,818.15. This alongside the stake sale to BP in the petro-retail JV, the total fund raise is in surplus of ₹1.75 lakh crore.

Last year at its 42nd AGM, Mukesh Ambani, RIL Chairman had assured the shareholders that the company was on the mode to become debt-free by March 31, 2021, which stood at ₹161,035 crores as on March 31, 2020. With the latest spree of investments, stake sale and rights issue RIL has become net debt-free.

"Over the past few weeks, we have been overwhelmed by the phenomenal interest of the global financial investor community in partnering with Jio...I also express my heartfelt gratitude to all the retail and institutional investors, both domestic and foreign, for their overwhelming participation in our record-setting Rights Issue," RIL chairman, Mukesh Ambani said in a statement.

"Today I am both delighted and humbled to announce that we have fulfilled our promise to the shareholders by making Reliance net debt-free much before our original schedule of March 31 2021," he further added.