B2B medical supply chain platform Medikabazaar scooped up $65 million led by Lighthouse India in April 2022 with a jump of almost 3X in valuation. The fundraising came on the back of its strong financial growth during FY22 when it scaled 2.74X while also controlling expenses well.
The operating gross revenue for the Mumbai-based company grew 2.74X to Rs 1,552.53 crore in FY22 from Rs 564.7 crore in FY21, according to the consolidated financial statements filed with the Registrar of Companies.
Medikabazaar’s platform enables hospitals and medical establishments to discover supplies, compare specifications and prices in real-time. It includes hospital devices, medical consumables, dental tools, and others. The sale of medical supplies is the sole source of income for the Vivek Tiwari and Ketan Malkan-led company.
The cost of procurement of supplies was the largest cost center for Medikabazaar, accounting for 77.5% of the total expenses. With the surge in scale, this cost proportionately increased 2.64X to Rs 1256.85 crore in FY22 from Rs 475.36 crore in FY21.
To expand the operations, the company hired more workforce, as a result, employee benefit costs jumped 2X to Rs 75.88 crore in FY22. This includes Rs 20.11 crore as ESOP expenses which were non-cash in nature.
The cost of advertisements expanded 3.65X to Rs 60.25 crore during FY22 while transportation distribution and discounting charges expanded 3.19X and 2.95X respectively to Rs 86.1 crore and Rs 69.1 crore in the last fiscal year.
The company added another Rs 17.55 crore and Rs 10.2 crore against legal professional charges and information technology costs which pushed the total expenditure of Medikabazaar by 2.68X to Rs 1621.57 crore during FY22 from Rs 603.96 crore in FY21.
With a surge of 2.74X in scale, the company kept a tight hold on overall expenditure, and corresponding to that, it recorded a loss of Rs 20.8 crore during the last fiscal year. During FY21, its loss stood at Rs 11 lakh.
Moving towards the ratios, its ROCE and EBITDA margin registered at -3.21% and -0.62% during FY22. On the unit level, Medikabazaar spent Rs 1.04 crore to earn a single unit of operating revenue.
The medical supplies/equipment segment, while undoubtedly huge in the context of the market size in India, also remains one of the toughest to crack for startups, requiring deep investments into people and staying on top of a dynamic environment. Even in Medikabazaar’s case, with no break up of sales available, it would be no surprise if the spike is on the back of a few products or product category where it has managed a competitive advantage. With offerings across a marketplace model, marketing and logistics solutions and even financing for medical institutions, MediKabazaar has set out to be the OfBusiness of the healthcare business, and if the founders have read it right, the firm has a very good chance of becoming one. Their investors are clearly betting on it.
