Paytm promotes Ajay Shekhar Sharma to CBO ahead of IPO

Ajay Shekhar Shama, brother of Paytm's founder and CEO Vijay Shekhar Sharma has been promoted as the chief business officer ahead of the $2.2 billion initial public offering of the company.

While the company did not comment on this escalation, as per Sharma's LinkedIn page he is the chief business officer of Paytm since August.

Earlier he was Senior Vice President of the online payments company. This is an interesting development which shows how his role has expanded in the company.

Earlier in the draft IPO filing also he was mentioned as a relative of the founder who owned interest in the voting power of that group that gave them "control" or "significant influence".

Paytm, which is targeting an initial public offering (IPO) of Rs 16,600 crore, offers payment, commerce and cloud and financial services to 333 million consumers and over 21 million merchants.

If successful, Paytm's IPO will be India's biggest public issue so far, a record that was previously held by Coal India, which raised Rs 15,000 crore over a decade ago, underscoring the appetite for new-age Internet companies among institutional investors.