ShopClues curbed loss by 37% in FY18 with 45% revenue jump: Will it finally stage IPO in 2019?

Gurugram-based online marketplace ShopClues has controlled its losses by about 37 per cent in FY18 as compared to the previous fiscal while its revenue saw a significant jump of 45 per cent during the same period. It has posted a revenue of Rs 275 crore and losses decreased to Rs 208 crore in the same fiscal.

The Tiger Global-backed company had posted a revenue of Rs 189 crore in FY17.

ShopClues seems to have controlled losses as it had cut-down marketing spends (especially outdoor and TV advertising) and somewhat by trimming workforce. It used to advertise heavily on television with Vijay Raj as its ambassador during 2015-16, however, the advertising campaign tapered off as it focused on improving unit economics.

With the financial disclosure by the company for FY18, it had accumulated a total loss of about Rs 1,080 crore. During the recently concluded fiscal, it reportedly spent Rs 100 crore towards employee benefits.

Importantly, the company’s net worth was zero (0) in FY17 as per its auditor owing to piling its losses.

The Sanjay Sethi-led e-commerce firm had struck a Rs 97.5 crore ad for equity deal with BCCL in September last year. This appears to have helped ShopClues to keep the tab on advertising cost.

Also read: How Unicorn ShopClues lost the plot and fighting for survival now

Interestingly, for the very first time, ShopClues didn’t mention Gross Merchandise Value (GMV) figure. For uninitiated, it claimed to achieve a GMV of $500 million in FY15, $1.2 billion in FY16 and about $3 billion during the financial year ending 2017 (source for GMV clocked in above FYs).

Unlike other marketplaces including Flipkart and Amazon, ShopClues has been focusing on tier II and III cities. The differentiated path from the aforementioned companies worked for ShopClues and it outran Snapdeal to claim #3 spot in FY17.

However, ShopClues had lost significant market share to Paytm, Flipkart, Amazon in FY18. According to some observers of e-commerce space, it barely had managed to cross $500 million GMV in FY18.

Two months ago, the Unicorn had raised $1 million bridge round from Ronnie Screwvala-led Unilazer. Notably, the company has been contemplating IPO for about 18 -20 months. Now it’s claiming to hit the stock market next year. However, considering financial figures of the six years old company in FY18, its plan for going public in 2019 still looks lame.

The development was reported by Mint via PTI.