Digital adoption solutions platform Whatfix, which raised $100 million from investors led by SoftBank last month as part of its Series D round, has announced its first ever employee stock ownership plan (Esop) buyback scheme amounting to $4.3 million.
All current and former employees will have the option to liquidate up to 35% of their vested Esops under the buyback.
The per share price will be at the company’s non-discounted valuation of around $600 million at the time of its Series D, a senior company executive said.
This means the price offered to the employee per share will be the same at which it was sold to the incoming investor in the Series D round.
Generally, companies buy back shares from employees at a discount.
“Of the 175 employees eligible for the buyback, only around 35 have chosen to avail it. This is because the employees believe in the growth (of the company) and would want to stay invested,” Khadim Batti, chief executive of Whatfix told ET in an exclusive interaction.
In June, the company raised $90 million in primary capital, while a small portion ($10 million) went towards secondary deals.
In February last year, Whatfix had raised $32 million in a Series C funding round led by Sequoia Capital India. Its other investors include Eight Roads Ventures, Cisco Investments and F-Prime Capital.
Founded by Vara Kumar and Batti, Whatfix provides in-app guidance and performance support for web applications and software products to businesses.
It helps enterprises deliver easy onboarding, training and self-service support. The company said last year its products have helped clients increase employee productivity by 35%, reduce training time and costs by 60%, and increase application data accuracy by 20%.
Whatfix joins a slew of companies that have announced Esop buybacks, offering wealth creation opportunities for staff.
Companies such as Udaan, Flipkart, Cred, Oyo, Unacademy, Meesho, CarDekho, Razorpay, Swiggy, Byju’s, Moglix, Cars24, MPL, Firstcry, BharatPe, Pharmeasy, and Zerodha have done Esop buybacks in the last three years.
Data shows that the Indian start-up sector emerged as a net-gainer of C-Suite movements as increasing possibility for wealth creation, rising number of liquidity events, and increasing Esop buybacks over the last year attracted CXO talent from large enterprises to start-ups.
Large enterprises accounted for 69% of the tech C-suite exits and 63% of the non-tech C-suite exits, according to a survey of 200 companies by specialist staffing firm Xpheno, shared exclusively with ET.
The start-up sector emerged the net-gainer of both tech and non-tech C-Suite movements, ET reported last month.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by The Technology Express staff and is published from a syndicated feed)
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