Nykaa founder Falguni Nayar on Wednesday became India’s seventh woman billionaire and the wealthiest self-made billionaire in an ongoing initial public offering (IPO) boom which saw the e-commerce giant making a blockbuster debut on Dalal Street, its parent company FSN floating on the Mumbai stock exchange .
Moments after the markets opened on Wednesday, Nykaa shares were being listed at ₹2,018 with around 80 per cent premium. According to the Bloomberg news agency, the market cap of the beauty and fashion retailer hit an overall valuation of 1 trillion rupees ($13.5 billion) in the first five minutes of trade. Within an hour and a half, Nykaa’s market cap had already matched industry giants such as Britannia, Godrej, and IndiGo.
Nayar, who formerly led a top Indian investment bank, founded Nykaa in 2012 just months before turning 50. Back then, most women in the country bought makeup and hair-care products at neighborhood mom-and-pop stores where the selection was scanty and trials unheard of.
Moreover, as Nykaa’s popularity grew, so did its brand appeal, with top Bollywood actors such as Katrina Kaif, and other social media influencers and celebrities helping the e-commerce platform break new ground in skincare and makeup carts of tech-savvy Indian women. The brand has also manufactured its own in-house brand of products since 2015 and recently began selling clothes and household products. It has a growing high street presence with 80 stores across 40 Indian cities.
