Miguel Cordon · · 1 min readProsus pulls plug on $4.7b BillDesk buy through PayU
Naspers’ global investment arm Prosus has pulled the plug on its plans to snap up payment gateway firm BillDesk for US$4.7 billion. The acquisition would have been made through Prosus’ Indian unit PayU.
Photo credit: PayU
In a note, Prosus said that the deal’s completion was contingent on getting approval from the Competition Commission of India (CCI).
While the investment firm secured this approval, Prosus said that it failed to fulfill “certain conditions” by the September 30 deadline. This has prompted the CCI to dismiss the acquisition deal automatically.
However, the company said it will remain committed to the Indian market and will keep growing its businesses within the region. Since 2005, it has invested US$6 billion into India’s tech landscape.
The PayU-BillDesk deal was announced in August last year. At the time, the two firms said they will work on a financial ecosystem that can handle four billion transactions annually, which was 4x of PayU’s level.
See also: 20 largest exits in India
Founded in 2002, PayU provides payment services to online merchants. Meanwhile, BillDesk was established in 2000 and offers a payment platform to enable banking and merchant website transactions.
Editing by Deepti Sri and Lorenzo Kyle Subido
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