Tiger Global and Microsoft are divesting their entire holdings, selling 10.39 Lakh and 36.78 Lakh shares, respectively
General Atlantic Singapore holds an 8.98% stake, Headstand Pte Ltd owns 5.73%, and 3State Ventures holds 1.03% shares in PhonePe
Promotoer Walmart owns a 71.77% stake in the company and is selling 4.59 Cr shares through the OFS
Shortly after receiving regulatory go-ahead for its confidential IPO papers, Walmart-backed fintech major PhonePe filed its updated draft red herring prospectus (DRHP) with SEBI for an OFS-only IPO, with shareholders offloading up to 5.06 Cr equity shares.
Promoter Walmart’s holding entity WM Digital Commerce Holdings plans to sell 4.59 Cr shares through the OFS. It is the biggest shareholder of PhonePe with a 71.77% stake in the company.
Additionally, other investors paring their stake in PhonePe include Tiger Global and Microsoft, who are divesting their entire holdings. Both companies own 0.2% and 0.71% of PhonePe, and are selling 10.39 Lakh and 36.78 Lakh shares, respectively.
Aside from its selling shareholders, General Atlantic Singapore holds an 8.98% stake, Headstand Pte Ltd owns 5.73%, and 3State Ventures holds 1.03% shares in PhonePe.
Cofounders Sameer Nigam and Rahul Chari, who are not offloading any part of their stake, hold 2.55% of PhonePe shares each. Ahead of its planned IPO, the cofounders sold a portion of their holdings to private equity firm General Atlantic. Each cofounder sold 84.2 lakh shares to the US-based investor at INR 2,338.60 per share, with the combined deal valued at INR 3,937.32 Cr. This allowed Nigam and Chari to each net INR 1,968.66 Cr from the sale.
General Atlantic, an existing investor in PhonePe, executed the purchase through General Atlantic Singapore PPIL Pte Ltd. The transaction was structured to cover withholding taxes arising from employee ESOP exercises.
Founded in 2012 as a digital payments platform, PhonePe was acquired by Flipkart in 2015. Following Walmart’s acquisition of Flipkart in 2018, PhonePe became a subsidiary under Walmart’s ownership.
Initially a payments platform that has risen to be crowned as the largest UPI player in India, PhonePe has diversified into becoming a full-stack financial services operator. Apart from merchant and consumer payments, which still make up for a bulk of its revenue, its other offerings include lending and insurance.
The fintech player’s revenue surged 22.2% to INR 3,918.5 Cr in the first half of FY26 (H1 FY26) from INR 3,207.5 Cr a year ago. At the same time, its losses widened by 20% during the same period, to INR 1,444.4 Cr in H1 FY26 from INR 1,203.2 Cr. Expenses during the period stood at INR 6,069.2, up 29.7% from the same period last year. Its loss would have been higher if not for its divestment in MapmyIndia for INR 480.9 Cr in June last year.
A Look At PhonePe’s Board
Rohit ran
Bhaga is the chairperson of PhonePe’s board and a non-executive independent director. He has previously served with Axis Bank as an independent director, BlackRock as chairman of the Asia Pacific region and Barclays Global Investors as chief operating officer.
Sameer Nigam
Nigam is the CEO and a whole-time director of PhonePe and has been with the company as a founder since 2012. He is tasked with building and scaling the company’s payments business and driving diversification efforts into other consumer tech sectors. Prior to starting PhonePe, Nigam served as the SVP of engineering and VP of digital business at Flipkart.
Rahul Chari
Chari is the co-founder, CTO and whole-time director of PhonePe, in-charge of the company’s tech stack and entry into new consumer tech sectors. Prior to joining PhonePe, he served as the VP of engineering at Flipkart.
Both cofounders had sold their earlier venture Mallers Inc, a digital media distribution company that was acquired by Flipkart in 2011.
Donna Catherine Morris
Morris is a non-executive director of the company nominated by Walmart, where she serves as the chief people officer and executive VP of global people. Prior to this, Morris was the chief human resources officer and executive VP of employee experience at Adobe.
John David Rainey Jr
Rainey is a non-executive director of the company nominated by Walmart, where he is the CFO and executive VP. Previously, he was the CFO and executive VP of global customer operations at PayPal and CFO and executive VP of United Continental Holdings.
Rachel Lee Brand
Brand is a non-executive nominee director (additional), nominated to the board by Walmart, where she served as the chief legal officer, executive VP of global governance and corporate secretary. Prior to this, she served the US government in several capacities, most notably as the associate Attorney General at the Department of Justice.
Leigh Douglas Hopkins
Hopkins is a non-executive director of the company nominated by Walmart, where he previously served as the executive VP of international strategy & development.
Manish Sabharwal
Sabharwal is a non-executive independent director of PhonePe. He is currently also the vice chairman of Teamlease Services and a member of the Comptroller and Auditor General of India’s advisory board. He previously served as independent director on RBI’s board.
Tarun Bajaj
Bajaj is a non-executive independent director of PhonePe and a certified CFA. He also serves as an independent director on the boards of Tech Mahindra, Bajaj Finance, Tata Power and Hindustan Unilever. He has previously been a board member of RBI, SEBI, SIDBI, Bank of Maharashtra, Bank of India, General Insurance Corporation, New India Assurance and United India Insurance along with serving as secretary at the departments of revenue and economic affairs.
Zarin Bomi Daruwala
Daruwala is a non-executive independent director of PhonePe and a certified CA and company secretary. She is currently the CEO of Prabhudas Lilladher Advisory and was previously the president of ICICI Bank and CEO of India and South Asia at Standard Chartered Bank.
Key Managerial Personnel
Adarsh Nahata
Nahata is the CFO of PhonePe and has been a part of the company since 2017. He has been leading the company’s finance function since its inception and is responsible for driving its strategic direction and finance organisation, while contributing to governance, compliance and business strategy.
Prior to joining PhonePe, Nahata has worked at Flipkart, Sterlite Industries and Graphite India across finance, controllership, governance, and business strategy roles.
In FY25, Nahata drew a salary of INR 2.5 Cr at PhonePe and bought ESOPs worth INR 18.9 Cr.
Ankit Gunvantrai Popat
Popat is the company secretary and compliance officer at PhonePe, leading several functions for the fintech giant, including mergers & acquisitions, governance, and secretarial within PhonePe’s legal team. He also oversees the governance framework and statutory compliances under various Acts and the shareholders agreement.
Popat has been with PhonePe since 2019, and played a key role in the company’s reverse flip from Singapore and the acquisitions of subsidiaries like Indus Appstore, Wealthdesk and OpenQ. Prior to joining PhonePe, Popat served with BookMyShow and CLP India.
In FY25, Popat’s salary amounted to INR 1.1 Cr and he bought ESOPs worth INR 99.3 Lakh.
