Group buying portal Snapdeal.com has raised $40 million in series B funding, led by Bessemer Venture Partners, along with existing investors Nexus Venture Partners and Indo-US Venture Partners. The investment comes barely six months after it has announced a $12 million series A round in January this year from Nexus and Indo-US Venture Partners.
Snapdeal has been rapidly expanding its group buying business and currently has a member base of over eight million. Besides offering deals for services like restaurants and spas, the company has also started offering various products such as luxury goods (sunglasses, watches) and gadgets (mobile phones, storage devices). Snapdeal's co-founder and CEO Kunal Bahl has told VCCircle that its products business has started to scale up really well. For instance, the company sold 500 branded wallets within 45 minutes only a few weeks ago and also sold over 2,500 branded sunglasses in a single deal in one day.
Bahl has also said that Snapdeal.com has recently launched a product called ‘Deals Near Me’ on its website, which will give its customers more localised deals (for example, at Kalkaji in Delhi). This product will also take into account customers’ preferences across products and services, showing more relevant deals on the home page. Besides, the funding will also be used to expand employee base and build a stronger management team.
Snapdeal.com has operations across 50 cities in India (which it plans to expand to 100 cities), and partnerships with over 10,000 brands and retailers across various categories. It was launched in February, 2010, with retail lifestyle services, but has diversified since into branded products, electronics, fashion accessories and travel. According to the company statement, Snapdeal is among the 20 most-visited websites in India (as per Alexa) and adds three new subscribers every second.
In an earlier interview, Snapdeal’s co-founder Kunal Bahl has told VCCircle that the company may acquire firms in Malaysia, Thailand, the Philippines and Indonesia. It is also planning to expand its
employee base to 800 from 400.
“The last 16 months have been the most exciting journey for our entire team. From entering a cluttered industry to establishing itself as a dominant e-commerce company in India, Snapdeal has come a long way. The exponential growth in the business has been due to the efforts of our 500-strong team and the support of our customers, merchants and business partners. This significant investment will help us expand our products business, further strengthen the local & national merchant deals vertical, and introduce various cutting-edge innovations to enhance consumer and merchant convenience,” said Bahl.