Tonbo Imaging Closes Debut 62% Above Issue Price, at About 128 Times Earnings, After a Sale of Existing Shares Only

Tonbo Imaging shares closed their first session on Friday, Oct. 23, at ₹1,133.65 on the BSE, 61.95% above the ₹700 issue price, after listing at ₹1,162, according to Inc42. The Bengaluru defence-electronics company received no money from the sale.

The IPO was an offer for sale only: about 1.22 crore existing shares, ₹852 crore in total, with no fresh issue. Every rupee went to selling shareholders. That sets the debut apart from a listing that funds a factory, and it is why the first-day gain accrues to buyers and sellers rather than to the company's balance sheet.

The numbers on the day

Inc42 gave the exchange data: a listing price of ₹1,162 on the BSE and ₹1,160 on the NSE, a session high of ₹1,209.85 on the BSE, and a close 2.44% below the listing price. The headline calls it a 66% premium; the update records 62% at the close. Market capitalisation at the BSE close was ₹6,493.79 crore, about $684.1 million in Inc42's conversion.

Measure	Figure
Issue price (band ₹665 to ₹700)	₹700
BSE listing price	₹1,162
BSE session high	₹1,209.85
BSE close	₹1,133.65
Overall subscription	135.9x

The issue ran from Oct. 15 to Oct. 19 and was subscribed 135.9 times, with qualified institutional buyers leading demand. Bids covered 115.87 crore shares against 85.26 lakh on offer. The anchor book raised ₹255.4 crore from 43 investors at ₹700, including SBI Mutual Fund, Goldman Sachs, BlackRock and WhiteOak Capital.

What the multiple says

At the top of the price band, Inc42's pre-listing analysis put Tonbo at about ₹4,010 crore, or roughly 79 times FY26 profit after tax of ₹50.88 crore. The close of ₹6,493.79 crore divided by the same profit is about 128 times. In one session the market added roughly ₹2,480 crore to the valuation, and the earnings it was applied to did not change.

Those earnings were falling. FY26 operating revenue dropped 22.7% to ₹362.6 crore from ₹469.1 crore, and net profit fell about 30% to ₹50.8 crore from ₹72.8 crore. The first quarter of FY27 brought a net loss of ₹17.7 crore on ₹36 crore of revenue.

Inc42's analysis adds the cash picture: operating cash flow was negative in both FY25 (about ₹136 crore) and FY26 (about ₹63 crore), and inventory rose from ₹219.49 crore in March to ₹319.63 crore in June. The June-end order book of ₹314.24 crore was about 87% of FY26 revenue, which is under a year of cover at the FY26 pace.

Who sold

The selling shareholders included the three cofounders. Arvind Lakshmikumar, Ankit Kumar and Cecilia D'Souza together received ₹137.2 crore, with Lakshmikumar's share ₹80.5 crore, Inc42 reported. That is about 16% of the issue by value. The remaining roughly ₹715 crore went to other sellers, whom the sources reviewed do not itemise.

The company's own account of the revenue drop, relayed by Inc42, is delayed international programmes in Morocco and Armenia. Its chief executive argues that defence businesses should be judged over three to five years. Tonbo says it has deployed over 28,000 systems in 24 countries, and names counter-drone high-power microwave systems as a growth driver, with deliveries expected in FY29 to FY30.

What the market is pricing

The reported grey market premium touched as high as 71% on the second day of bidding, so a gain of 62% at the close landed below where unofficial trading had pointed. Buyers who paid that premium in the grey market on Oct. 16 were not repaid by the first close.

Defence listings in India are being bought on order books and policy, not on trailing profit, and Tonbo's numbers show how far that has gone. A related read on how Indian public-market comparisons are shaping startup pricing is in our piece on Swiggy's Instamart inventory model, and the US side of the same repricing is in boom-era startups sold below peak.

The next hard data is the Q2 FY27 result. If revenue stays near ₹36 crore a quarter, annualised sales would be about ₹144 crore, well under the ₹362.6 crore of FY26, and the 128 times would need a new defence.