Unilever, Kalaari may lead upto $12 Mn round in Shop101

Social commerce platform Shop101 is in advance talks to raise $10-12 million round from new investors Kalaari Capital and Unilever Ventures. The startup's existing investors Stellaris Venture Partners and Vy Capital, will also participate in the upcoming round on a pro-rata basis.

In July, Stellaris led $5 million Series A round in the Bengaluru-based startup with participation of Vy Capital.

Citing anonymous sources a Mint report said that the fresh proceeds will be used for technological development and expanding into new categories such as beauty and personal care.

The development comes amidst growing interest of VCs in social commerce platform where Meesho and Wooplr have been leading the show along with Shop101. While Meesho already closed $50 million Series C round earlier this month, Helion Venture-backed Wooplr was in last leg to raised upto $20 million from Indian as well as Chinese investors.

Floated by Abhinav Jain and Aditya Gupta in 2015, Shop101 enables merchants to sell their products online and via social media platforms such as WhatsApp, Facebook, and Instagram.

Leveraging combined power of social media, resellers, and manufacturers, Shop101's growth has been driven by tier III and IV cities.

For merchants, Shop101 provides everything – right from website to SMS updates, e-mail updates, payment gateway, shipping partners, among other services. When it comes to the business model, it charges for services such as logistics and payments.

According to Entrackr’s sources, Shop101 does about 200-230K orders a month.

During a recent interview, Jain dislcosed that about 25 to 30 per cent (250-300K) users are active resellers on the platform.