Start-ups Taking IPO Route: How Many have Turned Profitable?

As more start-ups are listing for IPO in 2021, we analyse how profitable it has been for earlier start-ups who went public.


A whole bunch of Indian start-ups are now ready for IPO and some of them like Zomato and Barbecue Nation have already listed. India is clearly trying to create its own Nasdaq. Some of the earliest tech companies in India like MakeMyTrip and Yatra were listed in Nasdaq years ago.

We need to know what happened to these companies. 

MakeMyTrip’s profits after IPO

MakeMyTrip was hailed as the industry leader of the travel and ticketing sector. 

MakeMyTrip has seen a decrease of 60% revenue year on year. The decrease in revenue is mainly because of the ongoing impact of Covid since travel demand significantly reduced last year. 

MakeMyTrip made a dream debut on Nasdaq and enjoyed a fairy-tale listing. 

After the IPO, it was seen as one of the best companies to work for. 

The company was growing at 50% p.a, and 2000 transactions were happening in a day for MMT. It had raised 320 crores on the Nasdaq when it went public in 2010. The IPO was clearly a success and MMT was profitable up until Covid broke out. 

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The Happiest minds listing was stellar, and the company is reporting a net profit of rupees 45.3 crore which is up by 7.4% quarter on quarter.

JustDial profits after IPO listing

Justdial went public in 2013 and the IPO was one of the biggest of the year. 

It earned more than 200 crore rupees by selling shares to Goldman Sachs India equity fund, HSBC Mauritius ltd, Birla Sunlife Trust co. Pvt. Ltd., and Deutsche securities Mauritius ltd. 

After taking the IPO route, some of the highlights of Justdial’s growth and success were as follows:

In the early part of 2019, Just dial’s revenue was up by 15.9% in the 4th quarter of financial year 2019. It recorded an operating revenue of 2.3k M INR. The number of quarterly unique visitors for just dial applications stood at 31.1 M users. 

But as with MMT, even Justdial’s operations were impacted by Covid-19. It’s a quarter to net drop to 38% in October of 2020. During the same time in 2019, it had registered a net profit of 76.94 crores but in 2020 due to the covid impact, profits dropped to 47 crores. This was a 38% decline in consolidated net profit. 

Profitable IPOs you need to know

In 2020, more than 10 companies in India have taken the IPO route. Among the best performing IPOs, one of the successes is Happiest Minds Technologies which was listed on the 17th of September 2020. 

The IPO of happiest minds came at the right time. It surged by 14% recently and the stock has soared by 96%. Their shares also hit a new high of rupees 675 on the BSE. 

The Happiest minds listing was stellar, and the company is reporting a net profit of rupees 45.3 crore which is up by 7.4% quarter on quarter.

Indian travel company Yatra had gone public in 2016. In early 2021 in the month of February, Yatra’s Quarter 3 revenue increased by 70% because India’s domestic travel had regained momentum. This is for the current fiscal year 2020-21. There was a 17% quarter- on quarter improvement. This is a huge difference from other travel operators who were impacted due to the covid-19 pandemic. 

Yatra’s adjusted revenue for the quarter stood at $8.3M which is a growth of 60.6% quarter on quarter but there was a fall of nearly 62% year-on-y. This is a common trend with all the travel segment companies. 

Earlier this year, airline capacity and loads had improved. Revenues have definitely improved for yatra. This is due to the fact that it is more concentrated towards domestic travel.

The bottom line is that most of the start-ups which have taken the IPO route have been profitable not considering the revenue and operations impact of the Covid-19 pandemic. 

What’s in it for me?

It has now become much easier for start-ups to list in India thanks to Sebi. Sebi made a lot of changes to the listing rules on the Innovators growth platform. 

A lot of Indian start-ups are going public this year. Barbecue nation has already gone public. Flipkart, Zomato, Ola, Delhivery, Policybazaar, Freshworks, and Nykaa are some of the companies going public in 2021. 

Sebi has relaxed the norms for listing of start-ups and there is also relaxing of rules for companies which are seeking to migrate to the main board from the Innovators growth platform. This move by Sebi is encouraging successful Indian start-ups to list in domestic markets since most Indian start-ups want to list abroad. It is paving the path for opportunities for Indian investors. 

Anju Nambiar
Anju Nambiar
Anju has 5 years of experience covering business. She writes on startups, business life cycle and startup ecosystem. Her stints include Amazon and Adjetter Media Network.

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