Six years old Tracxn incurs Rs 22 Cr loss to earn Rs 33 Cr operating revenue

Over the years, there have been several attempts made to build the CrunchBase of India. But none has scaled beyond a particular threshold. VCCircle’s VCEdge and YourStory’s YS Profiles were early attempts that failed to turn into a meaningful product. 

Around the same time, Tracxn also came into the picture with the promise to build a superior data-focused product meant for VCs, market research firms, et al. The brainchild of former venture capital investor Abhishek Goyal and Neha Singh, Tracxn didn’t find much trouble in raising VC capital and has raised about $16.5 million till now. 

Nevertheless, the company has failed to scale as it was anticipated. After operating for six years, Tracxn’s revenue has been growing at a slow pace. Its revenue from operations recorded an increase of 19.26% from Rs 27.82 crore in FY18 to Rs 33.18 crore in FY19. 

This jump seems to be fueled by sales to foreign entities and its earnings in foreign currency, which grew by nearly Rs 7 crore from Rs 19.63 crore in FY18 to Rs 26.52 crore in FY19.

On the expense front, employees salary accounted for the largest burn. Employee benefit expenses made up almost 85.3% of the total expenses of the firm, which stood at Rs 56.01 crore during FY19. Notably, both employee benefit expenses and total expenditure were reduced by Rs 2.83 crore and nearly Rs 1 crore respectively as compared to the previous fiscal. 

The reduction in overall expenses was largely controlled as Tracxn slashed its spending on the workforce during FY19. Less expenditure and the rise in revenue caused the losses to decrease by 22.3% to Rs 21.66 crore in FY19 from Rs 27.87 crore in FY18.

Control over losses shows that the Bengaluru-based firm is prioritising unit economics over growth. For the unaware, Tracxn works with enterprises and investors across India, the US and South-East Asia. It essentially analyses sectors including enterprise applications, technology, consumer, mobile, digital marketing, health and education and many others.

Tracxn has been backed by top-tier investors including Sequoia Capital, SAIF Partners, Accel and Prime Venture Partners along with several blue-chip angels such as Ratan Tata, Sachin Bansal and Binny Bansal, Sahil Barua, and Girish Mathrubootham among others. It recently raised Rs 21 crore at a valuation of $78 million from KG Global Platform Fund.

While the financial health of Tracxn has improved in FY19 to some extent, still it’s far from being impressive. Significantly, the company has not been able to attract a large institutional round. It indicates that building a high-quality data-centric platform isn’t easy.