Everyone knows about the unbelievable amount of funds that big ecommerce players like Flipkart and Snapdeal have won in the past few months. But there are several smaller online marketplaces that are showing a lot of promise and are fast becoming investors’ favourites! Here are a few we have listed:
This company started with a niche set of products to offer- everything related to eye care! It has been recently reported that Lenskart has managed to garner funds worth Rs 135 crore, sponsored by a consortium of investors. This includes TPG Growth, Hong Kong-based TR Capital as well as existing investor, IDG ventures. In February 2013, Lenskart had raised about Rs 53 crores from Ronnie Screwvala-led Unilazer Ventures and IDG. So far, Lenskart has raised a total of Rs 200 crores in three rounds of funding.
Looks like CEO and founder Peyush Bansal has good reason to celebrate! Here’s what he says: “In TPG, we found strategic partners and advisors with proven capability to build a large consumer centric enterprise. The TPG brand is another feather in our cap. With this new investment, we will be hiring the best talent and give them a world-class environment to innovate and solve India’s eyewear problems at a very large scale.”
Reliable sources suggest that Purplle.com, a beauty and grooming ecommerce platform might have raised over $5 million in its first round of funding. The backers are believed to be IvyCap Ventures. Apparently, the company plans to use these new funds to improve its services and operations, including improving its fulfilment capacity. Purple had earlier secured an undisclosed amount of funding from a consortium of Blume Ventures, Mumbai Angels and The Chennai Angels.
We think that wellness and grooming and very lucrative ecommerce markets and it is heartening to see such an ecommerce platform get the right kinds of funds in order to run efficiently and smoothly.
Near.in provides services that are true to its name. This portal basically provides a variety of services that can be availed of in one’s locality. They have about 70 different categories that include home services, health professionals, repair, fitness, beauty, events, photographers and kids’ party services. These professionals are effectively scrutinised by the Near.in before being listed on the site and from the near future, only recommended professionals from the respective fields would be listed.
If the reports are to be believed, this company has received Rs 1.8 crore (under $300,000) in seed funding, co-led by Anupam Mittal, CEO of People Group, and Manish Vij of Smile Vun Group. Other investors include Prashant Tandon and Gaurav Agarwal (both part of Healthkart.com), Akash Agarwal of SAP Labs, Himanshu Aggarwal of education firm Aspiring Minds and Kevin Parikh of consulting firm Avasant.
Gympik.com has very smartlky cashed in on the city dweller’s need to be fit! It is the best online marketplace for fitness service providers. The company received $135,000 (about Rs 86 lakh) in seed funding from Capvent’s managing partners Tom Clausen and Rohan Ajila, as well as manufacturing firm Haldyn Glass. The round also saw participation from healthcare accelerator Healthstart.
Amaresh Ojha, co-founder and CTO of Gympik Health Solutions shares his plans, “The funds will be used for marketing, geographic expansion and for developing new features. It will also be used to enter newer verticals that also involve providing B2B software services to players in the fitness space.”
Well, we think Gympik’s business strategy looks quite fit!
In the buzzing world of ecommerce funding, this little gem went down because of the lack of it. Launched in 2011 by Amarinder Dhaliwal, Vijesh Sharma and Vijay Misra, this portal promised to mainly deal in fashion and apparel. However, this small ecommerce player could not stand up to the challenges of stark competition from the big fish. Unable to raise the requisite funds, this company has apparently shut its operations for some time now.
However, its investor is still optimisitic about the future of DonebyNone. Early-stage investor Seedfund has maintained that this venture is still alive and will be re-launching itself with a new team very soon. “The model has been changed completely. Now the company would focus on breaking even rather than the (topline) growth,” says Shailesh Vikram Singh, executive director of Seedfund. Singh is also a board member of DoneByNone.
It is interesting to note that some of the above ecommerce firms are offering services instead of tangible products to customers. This demonstrates how services have found a space in the ecommerce industry too! We know the competition can be tough sometimes, but all the ecommerce success around us is just so encouraging! We hope that ecommerce firms do not get bogged down by challenges and can continue to sell…because after all, patience pays!
Editor team is specialized in introducing the marketplace content targeting the Indian online sellers. They plan and coordinate to bring the appealing content for the small businesses on how to partner with the e-commerce sites like Amazon and Flipkart and strategies for improving their online business.
Leave a Comment
