Ideas|Products|Startups|VCs

SKS Microfinance which gives small loans to poor borrowers, founded by Vikram Akula is coming out with Initial Public Offering (IPO) of 16.8m shares with a fixed price band at 850-985 rupees/share. Thus SKS microfinance is all set to raise $353M from the IPO process.

SKS Microfinance is India’s biggest microfinance institution with a loan book of Rs. 4300 thousand Crores is well funded by  Sequoia Capital, Kismet Capital, Unitus, venture capitalist Vinod Khosla and Catamaran.

SKS Microfinance plans to use the share sale proceeds to augment its capital base to meet future capital requirements that is likely to be fuelled by growth in the business, the company said in its offering prospectus.

Vikram Akula, the founder and the chairperson, who owns 3.8 per cent in the company as employee stock options, said he had sold 25 per cent of his stake to a private equity firm.

Sequoia is going to make around 15-18x returns from its investments and Catamaran has also hit the jackpot with their first investee company going public.

-Hitesh, vcBytes.com

Gradatim raises $3M from NEA-IndoUS ventures as part of series A round funding. GRA-DA-TIM pronounced as grey-dey-tim is a Latin word meaning “step-by-step”, “gradually” or “by degrees”. Gradatim’s objective is to reduce the cost of computing, increase reliability and flexibility by transforming the way people use technology and third party outsourcing partnerships.

Gradatim, a pioneer in the Business Process Utility (BPU) space, delivers evolutionary, on demand business process utilities to customers across industries. Robust industry strength technology platforms which form the underpinning of Gradatim’s delivery makes Gradatim capable of managing parts of customer’s business in an efficient and cost effective manner.

Gradatim has operations in India, Australia and Singapore. Gradatim’s clients include MFIs and NBFC’s, Insurance providers across Asia and Australia.

-Hitesh, vcbytes.com