Exclusive: Bigbasket in talks to acquire micro-delivery startup RainCan, SuprDaily also in fray

Micro-delivery platforms have been witnessing a spurt in interest from investors as well as large grocery e-tailers including Bigbasket. While there were some media reports surfaced last month hinting that Bigbasket is in talks with Milkbasket and DailyNinja for investment, the Alibaba-backed company now seems closer to acquire Pune-based RainCan.

Bigbasket is in advance stage with RainCan and Mumbai-based SuprDaily for potential acquisition said two sources aware of the development. “RainCan seems to have better chances given the terms and conditions of ongoing talk,” confirms the above source.

Flush with $300 million fresh fund infusion from Alibaba, the Bengaluru-based company has been eyeing to enter subscription-based grocery cum milk delivery service from past couple of months.

“Bigbasket also hold talks with Sequoia Capital-backed DailyNinja. However, the talks failed to materialise for some unknown reasons,” adds one of the above sources. The sources also indicate that acquisition would be a mix of cash and stock component.

Also Read: Does BigBasket need to raise another mega round? Indeed, it has to

“Bigbasket is offering stock components to both companies as it sees subscription as an important business channel and eyes a significant revenue from micro-delivery segments in the next two-three years,” adds the first source.

Entrackr has sent emails to Bigbasket, RainCan, and SuprDaily for confirmation. We will update the post as responses come in.

Founded in June 2015 by IIT-Bombay alumni Munendra Singh and Abhijeet Kumar, RainCan offers a subscription model which offers morning and breakfast essentials such as dairy, meat, bakery, perishables, staples and more on a daily basis to customers.

Last year, RainCan had raised Rs 1.75 crore in its pre-Series A round from Prabodh Agarwal, Group CFO, IIFL Holdings Ltd and existing investor Aniruddha Malpani.

Meanwhile, a year ago, SuprDaily had raked in Rs 10 crore from Soma Capital, Great Oaks Ventures, 122 West Ventures including a consortium of Silicon Valley angels including Y combinator partners – Paul Buchheit, Jared Friedman.

Given the stagnation in online shopping base for past 18 months, grocery has become a top priority for horizontal e-commerce players such as Flipkart, Amazon and Paytm Mall. The gradual but decent adoption of the subscription-based model in Bengaluru and Gurugram seems to have enticed the attention of Bigbasket.