India’s Titan Company Buys Out CaratLane for $557M

Indian jewelry giant Titan Company will up its stake in e-tailer CaratLane to 98%, acquiring the share it didn’t already own for INR 46.21 billion ($557.2 million).

Titan, which already owns 71% of the online jewelry retailer, plans to buy an additional 27% in an all-cash deal, it said Saturday in a notice to the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE). It intends to complete the buyout by October 31, subject to requisite approvals.

The deal values CaratLane at INR 170.01 billion ($2.05 billion), according to Rapaport calculations.

Incorporated in 2007, CaratLane operates in India and in the US through a local subsidiary. Titan first took a stake in the business in 2016.

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Titan Closes Year with Strong Rebound in Jewelry Sales

With jewelry sales shifting online, CaratLane’s revenue jumped 71% to INR 21.77 billion ($262.5 million) in the fiscal year that ended on March 30, Titan said. Sales came to INR 12.67 billion ($152.7 million) in the 12 months ending March 2022, and were INR 7.23 billion ($86.2 million) the previous year.

“There could not be a better home than Titan for this [company],” CaratLane founder Mithun Sacheti said in an interview with India’s CNBC TV18. “In the life cycle of jewelry businesses, which run about 100 to 300 years, it’s only 15 years old. So there’s a massive [potential] from this point on.”

Main image: Mithun Sacheti. (CaratLane)