Business-to-business online marketplace Udaan has raised $585 million (about Rs 4,166 crore at current exchange rates) in its Series D funding round from a clutch of high-profile investors including Chinese conglomerate Tencent.
Altimeter Capital, Footpath Ventures and Hillhouse Capital also took part in the part, multiple media reports said, citing a company statement. Existing investors DST Global and Lightspeed Venture Partners also put money.
The fundraising round valued Udaan, operated by Bengaluru-based Hiveloop Technology Pvt. Ltd, between $2.5 billion and $3 billion. The company’s valuation had crossed $1 billion just a year ago when it raised $225 million (around Rs 1,593 crore) in its Series C round from DST and Lightspeed.
The Series D round takes the total capital Udaan has raised since its inception in 2016 to $870 million.
VCCircle has reached out to Udaan on the details of the funding, and will update this report accordingly. Last month, it was reported that the startup had raised $300 million as part of the Series D round.
Udaan will use the fresh capital to grow its marketplace, increase the depth of its product categories and invest in its technological infrastructure and delivery operations, the reports said, citing co-founder Vaibhav Gupta.
The company was co-founded by former Flipkart employees Amod Malviya, Sujeet Kumar and Vaibhav Gupta. It connects traders, wholesalers, retailers and manufacturers on a single platform, helping them discover customers, suppliers and products across categories and connect directly with each other for the best deal.
The startup had raised $50 million (around Rs 324 crore) in its Series B funding round from Lightspeed and Yuri Milner’s Apoletto Fund in February 2018. Lightspeed had put in about $30-35 million in that round while Milner’s fund accounted for the rest.
Deals in B2B e-commerce space
B2B startups operating in several segments have received considerable investor interest as they seek to offer efficiently-organised procurement and supply chain services to firms of all sizes.
One of the larger cheques to a startup in the segment was written for industrial goods marketplace Moglix, which raised $60 million (around Rs 410 crore) in its Series D funding round from US-based Tiger Global Management and others in July.
In August, ShopKirana E-Trading Pvt. Ltd raised Rs 71.4 crore (around $10 million) in a funding round led by Info Edge (India) Ltd, which owns a number of portals including job site Naukri.com. The same month, B2B marketplace for real estate and construction materials Infra.Market raised $3.5 million (around Rs 25.04 crore) in a seed funding round from Accel.
