By the way I hope no one considers this spamming, but I am watching very closely Satyam Infoway, the second Indian company to go public on the Naz this year; at least 20 more Indian IPOs are planned within the next year. The first, Infosys, has exploded violently upward, from 14 to Friday's 151 (it hit 180 briefly), and I am reasoning that a likely trajectory is in store for SIFY, which laying an awfully strong case for quickly becoming India's first mass-scale ISP, ala AOL. The telecom monopoly just ended there, and SIFY is quickly building a proprietary network. They only have about 90,000 subscribers right now, but even that piddly figure makes them the largest in the country. They are planning to use a big chunk of the IPO money (they raised about $75 million) on growing the business in hyperspeed, developing tons of local content, and generally trying to get the Indian masses to get online.
Clearly, it is only a matter of time before that happens. Whether SIFY can deliver is a completely different issue, of course. But they now have first-mover status, were underwritten by Merrill, use GAAP international standards and reporting methods, and seem hell-bent on doing it. They went public about two weeks ago, opened at about 30, shot to mid-50s, and is now at 38 something. There is a thread here on SI with several good posts. (you'll only have to wade through about 140 or so posts). I will dip my toe into the water tomorrow, and will be adding to it if we see steady appreciation.
I would love to hear from the good people of this thread on Internet use in India, if anyone knows anything. We might even be able to relate it back to Softbank somehow. What interests does sftbf have India, anyone know?
Thanks, and sorry for the off-topicity.
Yamakita |
