ShareChat earmarks $19 million for its first ESOP buyback

BENGALURU: Mohalla Tech, the parent company behind short video app Moj and homegrown social media platform ShareChat, has announced its first employee stock ownership plan (ESOP) buyback program worth $19.1 million (approximately ₹140 crore).

Close to 200 existing and former employees with vested options will be eligible to participate as a part of this buyback.

Mohalla Tech will be the sole buyer in this buyback process. Further, all eligible employees can sell up to 100% of their vested ESOPs at its present stock valuation, the company said.

This comes after the company recently raised over $500 million, at a valuation of $2.1 billion, making it the first social media platform to enter India’s growing list of unicorns. The round was led by venture capital firms Lightspeed Ventures and Tiger Global, with American social media giants, Twitter and Snap Inc, also participating as a part of this round.

“Today, ShareChat and Moj are the category leaders in the social media and short video space transforming the lives of millions of users. This exponential growth and success story wouldn’t have been possible without the relentless commitment of our people. With their immense passion and energy, we have seen the biggest growth trajectory in our history in the last few months. This ESOP buyback is our way of giving back to our employees by helping them in their wealth creation journey,” said Ankush Sachdeva, chief executive and co-founder of ShareChat.

Along with announcing the buyback, ShareChat also revised the existing vesting schedule. The new vesting policy will allow all the qualified employees to vest 25% of ESOPs in the first year, followed by 8.25% every quarter.

In case any employee leaves the organisation, the person gets to keep all the vested options and continues to enjoy the related benefits.

Further, the company has revised its ESOP exercise price from ₹1,551 to Re 1, bringing more benefits to the employees.

“We are presently witnessing an exciting growth journey and following an ambitious plan. Therefore, we have aligned our ESOP policy accordingly to reward our people who will be instrumental in paving the way for the next level of growth”, Sachdeva added.

Founded in 2016, ShareChat has raised over $766 million over six funding rounds so far.

ShareChat, at present, claims to have over 160 million monthly active users.