Joining the long list of Indian startups that have been trimming their headcount to cut costs, grocery-focussed social commerce startup Dealshare on Friday said it has laid off 100 employees, or around 6% of its 1,500-workforce across several verticals as part of a corporate realignment process.
“As part of our business restructuring plan and to sustain growth, we have taken a difficult decision to reduce the size of the team by 100 employees which constitutes only 6% of the company. We have taken adequate measures to compensate the affected employees,” the company said in a statement.
The realignment plan comes amid challenging macroeconomic conditions, which as per the firm’s founder and co-chief executive Sourjyendu Medda, are likely to continue in the near term.
“We have toned down the business plan a bit in terms of geographical expansion, and the newer spheres of the business that we were going to invest,” Medda said.
The firm looks to pare down expenses from those parts of its operations which “could lead to longer periods of cash infusion and investments, before becoming profitable.”
It aims to realign its operations, particularly in Madhya Pradesh and Tamil Nadu, which were among the recently launched geographies, as a measure to contain its costs. Currently, it operates in 150 cities.
Dealshare, operated by Merabo Labs Pvt Ltd, will provide a notice period of about three months to the laid off employees, along with out-placement support.
Medda added that the company may offer and extension to the notice period to employees unable to secure a job offer at the end of the three-month period.
At its peak during March-April 2022, Dealshare’s ARR (annual revenue run rate) stood at about $900 million, from which it has dropped by about one-thirds about to $600 million, after the company reduced its cash monthly burn by about two-thirds.
Even as the chief executive remained confident on the firm’s revenue growth, which stood at about Rs 1,933 crore at the end of financial year (FY) 2022, the firm may not be able to break even by FY23 end, he said. Dealshare incurred a Rs 67 crore loss at the end of FY22.
In 2022, over 19,000 were laid off across Indian startups, while this year, over 2,600 have already been sacked for a multitude of reasons including corporate restructuring, cost-cutting, or performance review.
This week saw layoffs particularly in the healthcare sector. Among the latest was SirionLabs, which fired about its 130 staff to realign business operations, followed by Innovaccer, laying off around 245 employees citing a similar reason. InMobi also cut 70 jobs as part of its performance review.
DealShare had joined the coveted unicorn club early last year after raising almost $130 million as a part of its Series E funding round from Tiger Global Management, Alpha Wave Global and others.