Paytm to acquire rival Freecharge; is free to sell to others: Report

Indian mobile-payments platform and e-commerce company Paytm has signed a non-exclusive term sheet to acquire rival FreeCharge, according to The Economic Times report. The report quoted different sources as saying that the deal is estimated to be between $45 million and $90 million, which is far below the price — $400 million — e-commerce platform Snapdeal had acquired it for in April 2015. The non-exclusivity of the term sheet, allows Snapdeal to sell the digital payments platform to other potential buyers. Earlier this year, Govind Rajan, CEO of Freecharge stepped down from the company, after being associated with this role for almost nine months. The ET report suggests that “Vijay Shekhar Sharma-led Paytm is in advanced stages of discussions to raise up to $1.9 billion in fresh funding from Japan’s SoftBank.