Within a week of Urban Ladder funding, its rival Pepperfry has announced Rs 250 crore fresh funds from State Street Global Advisors. Existing investors Norwest Venture Partners, Goldman Sachs, Bertelsmann India Investments and Zodius Capital also participated in the round.
The Mumbai-based company will use the proceeds to improve its product, spruce-up technology and expand its presence in tier II cities. With this round, the online furniture retailer has raised about $197 million total risk capital since its inception in 2011.
The company claims to have 65 per cent market share of India’s organised furniture market. It also says to have snapped up 25 per cent margin.
Besides furniture and home furnishing, it recently forayed into the mattress market with the launch of Clouddio to expand its in-house brands portfolio.
Currently, Pepperfry clocks an average order value of Rs 18,000 and boasts of a 4 million strong user base across 500 cities in the country. It also claims to have a variety of 1.2 lakh products with a transaction happening at every 25 seconds.
The company had clocked revenues of $15.19 million during the FY17, a 22 per cent growth from the previous fiscal.
During FY 16, the company’s revenue from operations stood at Rs 34.4 crore. Besides, the company also managed to reduce its losses to Rs 160 crore in the last fiscal as against Rs 181.3 crore a year ago.
Pepperfry also made debut in a furniture rental space in September last year. It introduced the rental service in Mumbai, Bengaluru, Delhi, Gurgaon, Hyderabad, Pune, Chennai, Noida, and Ahmedabad.
E-commerce behemoth Flipkart was also in talks with the Ambarish Gupta-led company for a possible investment. However, the investment talk seems to have fallen through.
Pepperfry’s rival Urban Ladder had recently scooped up $12 million from existing investors including Kalaari Capital, Sequoia Capital, Steadview Capital and SAIF Partners.
