Mamaearth founders selling shares in IPO is part of a new-age company trend

economictimes.indiatimes.com:

Varun Alagh and Ghazal Alagh are also selling 32.86 lakh shares of the 10.67 crore shares they hold in the Gurgaon-based company.

With a price band of Rs 308-324 per share fixed for the issue, the founders will together raise between Rs 101.22 crore and Rs 106.47 crore through this sale.

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Prior to the public offering, the promoters held a 37.41% stake in the omnichannel retailer—and this is expected to fall to 35.34% following the issue.

Typically, promoters selling stakes in their companies is deemed to be a negative signal by markets and public investors. But explaining the rationale of the founders participating in the Rs 1,336-crore offer-for-sale (OFS) component of Honasa Consumer’s IPO, the company’s cofounder and CEO Varun Alagh told ET in an interview on Tuesday, “Around 97% of our ownership continues… so it’s not like we’re parting with something considerable. This was an event in which we also chose to generate some liquidity for ourselves”.

“Moving forward it would get even more difficult…if a promoter tries to sell later, it comes across as a negative signal. It is also to build confidence with our other selling shareholders. At one point, the OFS book wasn’t getting built because people wanted to hold on for longer and to build that, too, we had to put skin in the game,” he claimed.

On the second day of its public subscription, the issue was 61% subscribed as of 1.45pm. The retail portion of the offering, which is 10% of