Chennai's film producer Sanjay Wadhwa and Mani Ratnam in Rs 1700 cr IPO US company

 

Mani Ratnam as investor  and Sanjay Wadhwa , MD of AP International ( owners of largest Tamil IP ) as board member along with many reputed Indian film corporate and non- film corporate  are to float a $230 million ( Rs 1,790 crore) IPO on Nasdaq exchange in name of International Media Acquisition Corp (IMAC), a  special acquisition company registered in New Jersey with Shibashish Sarkar, Reliance Entertainment CEO as the head.  

From South , Shashikant of YNot Studios (Vikram Vedha), Supriya of Annapurna studios, BVSN Prasad of Venkateswara Cine Chitra, T G Vishwa Prasad of People’s Media ( US based producer of Telugu films) and  Bollywood directors Luv Ranjan, Rohit Shetty , Neeraj Pandey and Imitaz Ali, along with actor Ajay Devgn and Vidyut Jammal are already on board. Ajay Agarwal from the apparel industry has too invested.

This is the second company after  Uday Shankar, President of Walt Disney Company in the Asia-Pacific region, and the erstwhile chairperson of Star & Disney India with James Murdoch floated  Seven Islands Inc  for INR 2,200 crore/ $300 million initial public offering (IPO) with the US Securities and Exchange Commission. Both the parties, Shankar and Murdoch will be co-chairperson of the company.

 

Markets  say that Sarkar who is CEO of the new company might end up buying  Reliance Entertainment which has been a burden for Anil Ambani.  Sarkar’s producing partner, Los Angeles-based Kintop Pictures-owner Deepak Nayar (“Buena Vista Social Club,” “Bend It Like Beckham,” “Bride and Prejudice”) is also named as an IMAC board member. The new company will be listed in July end. U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s son is teaming up with Paul Pelosi Jr., a former InfoUSA vice president and former Bank of America and JPMorgan Chase staffer, serves on the special purpose acquisition company’s board along with Hollywood mogul Greg Silverman, former president of creative development and worldwide production at Warner Bros. Pictures, David Taghioff, a former executive of talent agencies Creative Artists Agency and Suresh Ramamurthi , Chairman of CBW Bank  

PwC forecasts project that India will have the world’s fastest-growing media market, expanding an estimated 8.8% compound annual growth rate (or "CAGR") between 2019 and 2024 followed by  Nigeria (with an expected 8.6% CAGR), the Philippines (5.8%), Saudi Arabia (5.4%) and Pakistan (5.4%).

In early March, Anghami Inc, the Arab world’s leading music streaming platform,   merged with Singapore-based Vistas Media Capital  formed in August 2020 by Indian film producers Abhyanand Singh and Saurabh Gupta, and F. Jacob Cherian, who had previously set up two SPACs. .

A special purpose acquisitions company is essentially a shell company set up by investors with the sole purpose of raising money through an IPO to eventually acquire another company. The people buying into the IPO do not know what the eventual acquisition target company will be. Institutional investors with track records of success can more easily convince people to invest in the unknown. That’s also why a SPAC is also often called a “blank check company”.