Shadowfax eyes billion-dollar logistics opportunity in two-way trade between China and India

E-commerce and hyperlocal focused B2B logistics platform Shadowfax seemed to have travelled a quite a distance for a logistic firm since its inception in early 2015.

At a time, when many startups in the segment find hard to stay afloat facing challenges, Bengaluru-based firm has grown and been eyeing other markets for its expansion.

Claimed to be the largest crowdsourced delivery platform in India, Shadowfax is now all set to enter the Chinese market. The logistics platform plans to provide two-way trade services between India and China.

It also aspires to set up an office in China by the end of this year. Once operational, this will allow Shadowfax to give a wide range of channel to sellers to procure Chinese goods and sell on their platform. Similarly, many Chinese firms have also been eager to do businesses in India and a few of them are already selling through an online route.

Shadowfax reportedly focuses on China-to-India logistics segment for its sheer growth. The company already claims to have invested a lot in building proprietary algorithms to provide the best quality services, as per an ET report.

As per an estimate, the two-way trade between China and India in logistics has now crossed over $85 billion and expected to rise further in coming years.

Currently, Shadowfax fulfills over 1 lakh deliveries a day across categories including grocery, food, fashion and pharmacies, furniture, apparels, and electronics among others. The firm has operations in over 150 cities across India.

It boasts of having 5K plus partner networks, as per its website.

Over the years, the logistics firm has improved its growth trajectory and does not want to lose the momentum

In FY18, Shadowfax registered over 2X growth in revenue to Rs 76.3 crore revenue from Rs 31.7 crore in the preceding fiscal. It also curbed losses by 25 per cent to Rs 21.2 crore from Rs 28.5 crore during the same period.

After acquiring Sequoia-backed Nuvo Ex in 2017, Shadowfax claimed to have a leadership position in the reverse logistics segment in the country.

Meanwhile, last year in June, Shadowfax was also in talks with Chinese e-commerce major JD.com for probable investment. But talks could not materialise. In August, it raised $22 million in Series C funding led by Nokia Group Partner (NGP) Capital.

So far, it has got over $40 million investment from various investors and a few angels.

Shadowfax competes with the likes of Delhivery, Ecom Express, XpressBee, and Dunzo among others.