Exclusive: Amazon invests in re-commerce marketplace Cashify

E-commerce giant Amazon has invested in Cashify, a re-commerce marketplace for electronic devices such as mobile phones and laptops. The Gurugram-based startup had recently announced its $90 million Series E round led by NewQuest Capital Partners and Prosus.

Cashify has passed a special resolution to issue 10 equity and 2195 Series E preference shares at an issue price of Rs 2,39,696 per share to raise Rs 52.85 crore in its ongoing round. Amazon has participated with Rs 39.5 crore while existing investor Blume ventures pumped in Rs 13.45 crore. This appears to be a part of the Series E round.

Following this investment, Amazon will hold a 2.12% stake in the company.

Cashify lets customers sell and buy old electronic devices, mostly mobile phones and laptops. Apart from buying directly from users, the company works with several offline and online channels and OEMs such as Xiaomi, OnePlus and Samsung for their exchange programs. It also works with e-commerce marketplaces Amazon and Flipkart to ease the process of buying and selling refurbished phones and laptops.

According to Cashify, mobile and laptops constitute 90% of revenue for the company. It competes with Greendust and Yaantra which was acquired by Amazon’s rival Flipkart in a $40 million deal earlier this year.

Cashify’s growth in FY21 remained flat mainly due to the pandemic but the company had contracted its losses by 23.6% to Rs 35.3 crore during the fiscal year. Meanwhile, its operating revenue stood at Rs 340 crore in the fiscal year ending March 2021. The company is yet to file FY22 numbers.

In the past couple of years, Amazon has increased its investments in Indian startups. The backer of now acquired bus aggregator Shuttl, insurance startup Acko, fintech lender Capital Float and digital payments startup ToneTag, Amazon has also invested in D2C beauty brand MyGlamm, wealth management company Smallcase and acquired retail tech startup Perpule in 2021. The US-based company also acquired social commerce platform GlowRoad in April this year.

Last year, Amazon announced $250 million worth Amazon Smbhav Venture Fund for Indian startups and made its first investment in Gurugram-based MSME-focused fintech startup M1xchange.