Grofers tops up Series F round with $10 Mn fresh fund from Abu Dhabi's Capital Investments

Online grocery delivery firm Grofers has raised an additional  $10 million in the existing round of funding from Abu Dhabi based Capital Investments. The aforementioned investment entity seems to be used as an investment vehicle by Abu Dhabi Investment Group as per media reports.

The SoftBank-backed startup issued 1.9 lakh Series F shares at the same valuation as previous Series F investments - $497 million.

This tranche is a part of the  $200 million Series F round it had announced in May this year out of which only $130mn has been received through its Singapore based holding company till now.

This fresh investment comes after Softbank had invested  $60 million in the online grocery company in February this year.

The firm is looking to use these funds for expansion and market penetration as the online grocery market has been firing up recently. Grofers has pivoted from the grocery retailing model and adopted a pure-play private label strategy. The new model helps it end the rivalry with BigBasket which does on-demand deliveries.

The company has been positioning more like a monthly stock-up rather than on-demand. It recently tied up with several Kirana stores to turn them into Grofers’ branded store. Besides grocery and FMCG products, it has been pushing for aligned categories such as kitchen utensils and cosmetics.

Grofers reported total revenue of Rs 53.4 Cr in FY 18. With 39.5% of that coming from mutual fund sales, leaving operational revenue made by the sale of products at only  Rs 29.83 crore.

While the firm has witnessed a valuation haircut when it raised a round from SoftBank last year, it didn’t see any valuation erosion in the $62 million round this year. The Albinder Dhindsa led company was eyeing the coveted tag of a Unicorn in this round. However, it appears it’s still another round away from being valued a billion USD.

( Hat tip: paper.vc)