The Vodafone Idea (VIL) follow-on public offering (FPO) of Rs 18,000 crore has been executed flawlessly in spite of the unstable market conditions. By Monday at 1:42 p.m., the issue had 1.5 times as many subscribers. In contrast to the 12.6 billion shares that were offered, the nation's largest-ever FPO received offers for around 18.73 billion shares, with 6.72 billion of those bids coming from foreign portfolio investors (FPIs).

The FPO's retail component was subscribed 0.95 times, the high net worth person (HNI) portion 2.3 times, and the qualified institutional buyer (QIB) portion 2.82 percent. Anchor investors, which include GQG Partners Fidelity, Stichting, Redwheel, Motilal Oswal Mutual Fund, and Troo Capital, have already received 4.9 billion shares from VIL.

In the secondary market, VIL's shares were down 5.4% and trading at Rs 12.2. As a result, the discount to the highest point in the FPO pricing range of Rs. 11 is now less than 10%.

It is anticipated that the troubled telecom operator would have a few more years of runway thanks to the FPO profits and the recent Rs 2,075-crore preferential issue granted to the promoter Aditya Birla group.

With the money from the FPO, VIL intends to establish new 5G sites and extend the current and new 4G sites. For postponed spectrum payments to the Department of Telecommunications, it will spend around Rs 2,175 crore.

With a net value of Rs 74,359 crore at the end of March 2023 and total outstanding debt of Rs 2.38 trillion, Vodafone Idea is now among the most financially strained and indebted corporations in the nation. 

For the last eight years, the mobile operator has been losing money constantly. In FY 2022–2023, the company recorded a net loss of Rs 29,371 crore and a cash loss of Rs 6,251 crore. 

Vodafone Idea has fallen behind its competitors in terms of new investment in network expansion and innovative technologies like 5G because of ongoing losses from its operations.

For instance, Vodafone Idea has invested about Rs 48,000 crore in capital expenditures over the previous three years, which is less than half of what Bharti Airtel has invested, which is approximately Rs 1.12 trillion, and one-fifth of what Reliance Jio has invested, which is almost Rs 2.5 trillion.