Cloud4C looks to raise around $20 million by divesting a minority stake
Cloud4C, touted as the world’s only Tier-4 cloud solutions firm, promoted by Tier-4 datacentre services provider CtrlS is looking at raising around $20 million by divesting a minority stake. The cloud solutions firm that kicked off commercial operations in April 2015 would divest a maximum of 25% stake for initial round of private equity funds, said chairman Sridhar Pinnapureddy, which values the company at around $80 million. The existing investors of CtrlS, who prefer asset-heavy firms with land and buildings, plan to invest in Cloud4C only once its revenues reach sizeable level and it turns relatively asset rich, he said. Och-Ziff Capital had invested Rs 250 crore in four installments since 2008 in CtrlS, which claims to be the Asia’s largest Tier-4 data center with a global market share of around 10%. Sridhar said Cloud4C, which has so far invested around $40 million on technology architecture and human resources, is looking at setting up its public cloud infrastructure for critical applications in 17 countries in South East Asia, West Asia, Africa and Australia by the year-end. “From around Rs 40 crore of revenues over the last few months, we hope to close the first year with around Rs 100 crore of income and touch the Rs 1,000-crore mark in revenues over the next four years,” said Sridhar. Sridhar said while Cloud4C was set to see faster growth in revenues at over 100% a year, CtrlS would continue to witness healthy EBITDA of around 50% with topline growth of 40% CAGR. “We may divest a maximum of around 25% stake for $20 million in first round. We may end up diluting lower than that if we get better valuations owing to faster than anticipated growths.” BS Rao, vice-president, marketing, said Cloud4C services has already signed up with around 1,800 clients which includes established global brands such as World Bank, Times Group, Jabong.com and Daimler Chrysler.