Zetwerk buys back ESOP worth $8.3 Mn from employees and early investors

Business to business marketplace for custom manufacturing Zetwerk has bought back employee stock options or ESOPs worth $8.3 million from its employees and early backers.

The company did not disclose the particular number of employees and the name of early investors participating in the program. It’s worth noting that Zetwerk had recently concluded its $120 million Series D round and counts Sequoia Capital, Kae Capital, Greenoaks and Accel Partners as early backers.

During the last round, Zetwerk’s valuation was estimated at around $600 million.

According to Zetwerk, a large section of its workforce participated in the ESOP liquidation process which was done in three rounds. Currently, the Bengaluru-based company has around 400 employees.

In September 2020, Zetwerk had expanded its ESOP pool by adding Rs 4.77 crore worth of stock options. During the expansion, the company also made an allotment of equity shares to its 24 employees under the ESOP scheme. As per Fintrackr’s calculations, Zetwerk’s co-founders Rahul Sharma and Vishal Choudhary received equity shares worth Rs 2.8 crore collectively. 

Founded by Amrit Acharya, Srinath Ramakkrushnan, Sharma and Chaudhary, Zetwerk connects buyers and suppliers for manufacturing jobs. The three-year-old company partners with offline suppliers who are engaged in fabrication, machining, casting, forging, and galvanizing of machine parts. 

According to the company’s website, it is operational in over 15 countries and claims to serve over 100 customers across more than 25 industries in India, North America, Middle-East and South-East Asia.

The company had also improved its topline in FY20 and recorded more than a 20X jump in its operating revenue to nearly Rs 322 crore. While its losses grew 6.5X to Rs 29.05 crore in FY20, it managed to improve its EBITDA margin in the last fiscal year.