Lenskart's Peyush Bansal: From LinkedIn Connections to Billion-Dollar IPO Success

Peyush Bansal's equity could exceed $1 billion if Lenskart shares surge approximately 25% upon their market debut.

Over 15 years ago, Peyush Bansal established eyewear manufacturer Lenskart Solutions Ltd. with partners he connected with through LinkedIn, transforming it into a multi-billion dollar enterprise. Now the 41-year-old entrepreneur and Indian television personality stands on the brink of a significant financial windfall.

Lenskart is planning its Mumbai listing as early as next month, aiming for a market debut valuing the company at $9 billion, according to sources familiar with the matter and calculations from the prospectus.

This valuation would provide the entrepreneur with a stake close to $800 million after selling a small portion of his shares in the IPO, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index. His equity could potentially cross the $1 billion threshold if Lenskart shares increase by approximately 25% upon debut.

Bansal's journey to a public offering demonstrates the returning investor confidence for certain founder-led ventures following a period when India's leading startups struggled for survival amid dried-up funding. Lenskart has established a distinctive position with robotic production facilities in India using German-imported machines to manufacture glasses, alongside a website enabling customers to easily order and remotely test their purchases.

Beginning with a substantial domestic market, Lenskart is already expanding throughout Southeast Asia, where Bansal notes that demand patterns in Indonesia and Vietnam mirror India's trajectory from a decade ago.

"India is the myopia capital of the world, and a lot of our people need glasses," Bansal stated in a Mumbai interview. "If we can solve that, everything else, including scale, profit and rising market capitalization, will follow."

Bansal differentiates himself from earlier Indian consumer-tech listings by highlighting that his company already generates profit. The Gurugram-based business, which designs, manufactures, and sells eyewear through online platforms and retail outlets, reported its first-ever full-year profit in the year ending March 31.

He also benefits from an established retail fanbase. Beyond Lenskart, Bansal serves as a judge on the Indian franchise of the American show Shark Tank and has accumulated over 900,000 Instagram followers.

In his business endeavors, he attributes success to timing and persistence. Bansal humorously notes that he and co-founder Amit Chaudhary dedicate one day weekly to brainstorming new ideas, with varied results.

"Our hit rate is about 50%," he remarked. "A coin toss might have worked just as well."

This year, he has navigated a stock debut amid trade wars and geopolitical headwinds, coupled with increasingly cautious investors.

While India's startup ecosystem ranks among the world's largest, valuations have plummeted for several companies struggling with growth as investors pose more challenging questions. The family office of tech billionaire Narayana Murthy recently highlighted steep discounts driven by funds needing to exit investments. Oyo Hotels, which like Lenskart is backed by SoftBank Group Corp., was once among India's most valued startups at $10 billion in 2019 before experiencing a valuation collapse and subsequent recovery.

Bansal's approach has attracted investors who value patience over flash. SoftBank, owning approximately 15% of the company, describes its Lenskart stake as patient capital willing to wait decades for compounding growth. Earlier this year, investor Fidelity Management & Research valued Lenskart at $6.1 billion.

The IPO will test whether the resurgence in investor appetite for Indian consumer-technology stocks has lasting power. Urban Co.'s impressive debut last month, which saw the rent-a-service marketplace's shares surge 62% on opening day, revived optimism following a series of disappointing post-market performances from other startups that had dampened enthusiasm for the sector.

Nevertheless, Lenskart remains dependent on China for over one-third of its purchases, including frames, molds, and raw materials – a reliance Bansal acknowledges but describes as manageable. This dependence exposes the firm to China's supply-chain fluctuations, where tariffs or export restrictions could impact deliveries and reduce margins.

Currently, Bansal is overseeing development of a new manufacturing facility in Hyderabad, expected to become the world's largest, spanning 50 acres with daily production capacity for hundreds of thousands of glasses.

An engineering graduate from McGill University in Montreal, Bansal began his career at Microsoft Corp. in Redmond, Washington, before returning to India to pursue entrepreneurship. His initial venture, a student-housing platform, evolved into a broader mission after identifying a significant gap in vision care. From a modest office in Faridabad near Delhi, he and three LinkedIn-sourced partners established Lenskart.

The company now controls virtually every aspect of its value chain, from lens design and manufacturing to final delivery. It employs hundreds of ophthalmologists in Kolkata providing remote eye consultations and is developing AI-based testing tools to serve smaller cities with limited eye care access.

Lenskart plans to utilize proceeds from its share sale to establish new stores across India, invest in technology and artificial intelligence capabilities, make acquisitions, and fund general corporate purposes, according to filings.

As of March, it operated 2,723 stores across India and markets including the Middle East and Southeast Asia. Nearly 40% of its revenue now originates outside India, highlighting its expanding international presence.

Its next major initiative is smart eyewear. A 70-member team is working to integrate features such as UPI, AI tools, cameras, and headphones.

"It's tempting to go all in," Bansal said. "But timing matters."

(This story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)