Fatpipe calls off IPO, looks to PE

Fatpipe Networks India Ltd, which provides wide area networking (WAN) products, has decided to withdraw its initial public offering (IPO).

The company stated this was due to market conditions and that private equity (PE) was one good possibility now. The company planned to raise around Rs 50 crore through the IPO.

Ragula Bhaskar, chairman and managing director, Fatpipe Networks, said "we did withdraw it last night (on Sunday night) due to market conditions, and plan to visit the issue later when market conditions improve. FatPipe will continue to implement its growth strategies." 

The offer was subscribed 0.87 times on the last day of the issue on Monday. By 4 pm IST, the IPO got bids for 53.43 lakh shares compared with 61.25 lakh shares on offer.

The bidding for the IPO began on June 7, 2010. The company also revised the price band to Rs 80-85 per share, from Rs 82-85 per share set earlier.

The company was planning to raise Rs 50 crore through the offering, which will be used for both organic and inorganic growth, according to company's senior official.

"Now PE is a good possibility and also since we are pretty much debt free company, we also have access to potential lines of credit," said Bhaskar.

"We were planning to utilise the fund for strategic acquisition of business/company to feed over 700 reseller channel." The company was looking at companies operating in networking space. "We are looking at acquiring to the tune of $5 million," said Bhaskar.

Fatpipe Networks has about seven multiple patents holder of WAN technology that provides reliable, redundancy, speed for WANs.

Fatpipe is based in Chennai and has offices in the United States with over 1500 customers including the US Supreme Court, the FBI and companies like Wheels India, EID Parry, Mundra Port and others in India.