XpressBees, the e-commerce-focused end-to-end supply chain solutions provider, turned unicorn after a $300 million round led by Blackstone Growth, TPG Growth, and ChrysCapital in February this year. The company raised the fund at the end of FY22 during which it demonstrated a strong financial performance with revenues of more than Rs 1,900 crore and inched closer towards break even.
The company provides supply chain solutions including B2B/B2C express delivery service, cross-border logistics, and warehousing services to e-commerce players including Snapdeal, Myntra, Meesho, Netmeds, and Bigbasket. Revenue from logistics services is the largest source of revenue for the Pune-based company and forms 99.7% of the total revenue.
Income from logistics services surged 88.3% to Rs 1,900 crore in FY22, as per the annual financial statements filed with the Registrar of Companies (RoC). XpressBees claims to handle over 3 million shipments per day with over 3,000 office centers across 2,500 cities. The sale of scrap and other operating revenues collectively stood at Rs 5 crore in FY22 while the company also earned Rs 26 crore from its financial assets.
On the cost front for XpressBees, logistics cost was the largest cost center accounting for 78% of the overall cost. This expense spiked around 88% to Rs 1,527 crore in FY22, keeping pace with revenue growth in the segment. Expenditure on employee benefits formed 9.5% of the total annual cost and grew 56% to Rs 186 crore in the last fiscal year.
Rental costs increased by 40.7% to Rs 38 crore in FY22 even as legal and professional costs rose steeply by 87.5% to Rs 30 crore.
The company added another Rs 25 crore as server hosting charges which pushed the total annual costs by 80% to Rs 1,957 crore in FY22.
With growth in scale of over 88%, the company has managed to control its overall losses which shrank 57% to Rs 27 crore in FY22. XpressBees’s cash from operations turned positive with Rs 61 crore while ratios like ROCE and EBITDA margin also improved significantly. On a unit level, XpressBees spent Rs 1.03 to earn a rupee in FY22.
Founded by Amitava Saha and Supam Maheshwari, XpressBees started its journey as the logistics arm of FirstCry. However, it relaunched as a separate entity in 2015 which has worked out well when one considers its growth since then.
