XpressBees enters unicorn club after $300 Mn Series F round

XpressBees, e-commerce focused end-to-end supply chain solutions provider, has raised $300 million in its Series F round led by Blackstone Growth, TPG Growth and ChrysCapital. Existing investors such as Investcorp and Norwest Venture Partners also participated in the latest round.

XpressBees will use the fresh capital to become a full-service logistics firm, for product development and hire talent, said the company in a press release.

The Pune-based startup had raised $110 million in its Series E round from Investcorp, Northwest Venture Partners, and Gaja Capital. 

XpressBees has raised the fresh capital at a valuation of $1.2 billion, making it the eighth unicorn of 2022 and 51 since January 2021. The company has raised around $500 million to date. 

Founded by Amitava Saha and Supam Maheshwari, the firm had started its journey as logistics arm of FirstCry but in 2015, it relaunched as a separate entity. The company offers first and last-mile delivery and reverse logistics with facilities such as real-time tracking, multiple payment collection and processing options.

Currently present in more than 3,000 cities, XpressBees claims to serve over 20,000 pin codes and delivers over 1.5 million packages per day. It works with notable companies such as Flipkart, Amazon, Meesho, Purplle, Myntra, FirstCry and Shopee.

XpressBees has also become the fifth startup from logistics space to enter the unicorn club and second this week. The list includes Delhivery, Rivigo, Blackbuck and ElasticRun. Pune-based ElasticRun had raised $300 million at $1.4 billion valuation whereas BlackBuck and Rivigo are also valued at over $1 billion. Delhivery is likely to be valued in the range of $5.5 billion in its Initial Public Offering (IPO).

While XpressBees is yet to file annual balance statements for FY21, the company had registered a 40% increase in its operating income to Rs 757.27 crore in FY20 as compared to Rs 540.95 crore FY19. Revenue wise, XpressBees would be in the top-five supply chain logistics players. According to Fintrackr, the company had witnessed a slight improvement in unit economics and posted a loss of Rs 102.68 crore in FY20.

With 43% growth in its operating revenue, the company’s rival Shadowfax had grown at a decent pace in FY21. The Bengaluru-based firm had crossed Rs 460 crore income mark whereas its losses climbed 53% to Rs 133 crore during the last fiscal year.