New twist to Mu Sigma saga as CEO, PE investor seek to sell stake

By Manu P Toms

  • 08 Aug 2016
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Two months after the divorce of Mu Sigma Inc’s power couple—founder Dhiraj Rajaram and CEO Ambiga Subramanian—became public, there is new twist involving the US-incorporated Indian analytics company.

The Mint newspaper reported, citing people aware of the development it didn’t name, that Subramanian and private equity investor General Atlantic are seeking to jointly sell their combined 48% stake in the company.

Subramanian did not respond to text messages and phone calls from VCCircle. Spokespersons for General Atlantic and Mu Sigma did not respond to emails seeking comment.

The news comes after Rajaram said at the time of his split from Subramanian that she would not continue as the CEO post in the long term. 

Subramanian was made the CEO only in February. A former research lead at Motorola, she had held a number of senior roles including that of chief operating officer at Mu Sigma before being named the CEO.

Separately, investor Patrick Ryan earlier this year dragged the company to court accusing Rajaram of misleading him into selling his shares back to the promoters. He alleged that Rajaram put pressure on him and bought shares at an artificially lowered price.

Founded in 2004, Mu Sigma provides analytics and decision-making support services to businesses in a wide range of industries and is backed by investors including General Atlantic, Sequoia Capital India, Mastercard Inc. and FMR LLC. Its early investors Accel India and FTV Capital had previously exited.

The Mint report cited a Sequoia spokesperson as saying that the firm had no plan to sell its stake in Mu Sigma.

Mu Sigma has so far raised close to $160 million from investors. The company has been valued around $1.5 billion and is one of a handful of Indian unicorns, or private companies valued above $1 billion.

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