In the largest offering of shares yet from India, Indian software giant Infosys has placed 30 million equity shares worth $1.6 billion with foreign investors Tuesday.

The Bangalore-based company said the issue was oversubscribed 3.4 times.

Shareholders of Infosys, including promoters, are offloading these shares currently listed on the National Stock Exchange of India. At $53.50 apiece, each American Depository Share (ADS) will fetch promoters a few hundred million.

Some downward pressure on the local stock price was felt Tuesday as it fell 1.5 percent in an otherwise rising market.

As part of this offering, 5 million ADSs representing 5 million equity shares will be placed with Japanese investors through a Public Offer Without Listing (POWL).

Since this is not a fresh issue of stock, Infosys will not receive any proceeds of the offering. However, it will increase the size of Infosys’s United States float to about 19 percent of equity capital from the current 14 percent.

“We want to position ourselves as a global company,” said Infosys CFO V. Balakrishnan.

The strategy is to be the first Indian company to enter the Nasdaq 100 Index.

This is not the first time the company has made sponsored offerings. The software giant first sold ADRs and listed on Nasdaq in 1999. It subsequently made two sponsored ADR offerings.

In July 2003 Infosys priced its 5.22 million sponsored secondary ADSs at $49 each, totaling $552 million. In 2005 the company offered 14 million ADSs on the Nasdaq at $67 a share. It was also the first time an Indian company had placed shares with Japanese investors (3.2 million ADSs) through a public offer without listing.

Among the sellers in this round are Infosys Chief Mentor N.R. Narayana Murthy, who will net over $200 million through sale of 4 million shares, bringing his stake down to 5.13 percent. CEO Nandan Nilekeni’s stake will drop to 3.55 percent with an offer to sell 2.79 million shares and will net him $155 million.

Infosys’ revenues are expected to cross $3 billion for the financial year ending March 2007.

Info Edge IPOs

Separately, the IPO of pure play Internet company Info Edge (a 2006 Red Herring Asia 100 company) listed on Tuesday on India’s National Stock Exchange at a premium of 50 percent over its issue price of 320 rupees ($7) and hit a near-double high of $14 before closing 85 percent higher at $13. The issue was oversubscribed 55 times.

Info Edge owns India’s top job site naukri.com, a matrimonial portal called Jeevansaathi.com, and a real estate site known as 99acres.com.

In May 2006, Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers and Sherpalo Ventures picked up close to a 5 percent stake in Info Edge for $4.6 million. India’s ICICI Venture had invested around $1.8 million in the company in 2000 for a 9.8 percent stake.