Indian behemoth Reliance Industries Ltd.'s digital arm Jio Platforms has raised $750 million from Abu Dhabi's sovereign wealth fund, it announced Sunday.
What Happened
The investment will give Abu Dhabi Investment Authority a 1.16% stake in Jio, the latter said. Morgan Stanely MS advised Reliance on the investment.
ADIA's funding is the latest in a string of investments announced over the last months.
Facebook Inc. FB acquired a nearly 10% stake in the company for $5.7 billion in April.
The social media giant's investment was followed by four other United States-based firms. Silver Lake invested $748 million, General Atlantic put in $871 million, and Vista Equity Partners and KKR & Co. Inc. KKR each funded Jio with $1.5 billion.
The Indian telecom network company last week said it also raised another $1.5 billion from Abu Dhabi state-owned venture firm Mubadala.
Why It Matters
Investors are rushing to Jio's side at a time when it is preparing to enter India's e-commerce sector, in partnership with Facebook's WhatsApp, in a bid to challenge the dominance of Amazon.com Inc. AMZN and Walmart Inc. WMT subsidiary Flipkart.
Jio was launched publicly as a telecom network in 2016 by Asia's second-richest person Mukesh Ambani and has since expanded to a variety of digital services, including streaming video on demand, news, and music services.
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