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Ashok Soota, former chairman of IT firm MindTree, on Thursday sold half of his 11.4 per cent stake in the company in a block deal to Cafe Coffee Day group's owner V G Siddhartha.
Siddhartha also runs Global Technology Ventures, which holds 6.12 per cent stake in MindTree prior to this deal. His total stake now stands at 12.35 per cent.
A MindTree spokesperson confirmed the news. "One of the entities run by Siddhartha has bought the stake," she said.
As per Wednesday's closing price of Rs 392.65, the deal could be worth Rs 95.61 crore (Rs 956.1 million).
According to reports, the deal was done at Rs 428 per share, which is at an 18.58 per cent premium vis-a-vis on Wednesday's closing price of Rs 361. This, however, could not be ascertained.
Soota also confirmed that he has sold his 5.5 per cent stake in the IT company, but he did not specify the buyers and price of the deal.
He added that the sale took place on the National Stock Exchange at a decent premium.
Shares of MindTree zoomed up by over 19 per cent in morning trade on the bourses following the reports that 22 lakh (2.2 million) shares of the company changed hands in a block deal. The stock soared by 18.17 per cent to touch a month's high of Rs 426.60 on BSE, while on NSE, the scrip surged by 19.13 per cent to touch an early peak of Rs 430.
The stocks settled at Rs 392.65, up 8.77 per cent from its previous close on BSE.
Soota, along with nine other industry professionals, had set up MindTree in August 1999. In January this year, he resigned from the post of executive chairman to start his new business venture, Happiest Minds Technologies.
Speculations are Soota would use the funds raised from this stake sale in his new venture. To be launched in later half of the year, Happiest Minds will offer six lines of business -- IT services, R&D services, software product engineering, remote infrastructure management, testing and consulting.