Make-up brand SUGAR Cosmetics has raised $21 million (Rs 153 crore) in its Series C funding round led by Elevation Capital (formerly SAIF Partners).
The company's existing investors A91 Partners, India Quotient and Stride Ventures also participated in this round, as per a press statement.
The company will utilise the funding to build both digital and retail distribution.
"While the COVID-19 disruption was a spanner in the works, we were quick to bounce back to 150% of our pre-pandemic revenues last quarter and that too profitably," said Vineeta Singh, co-founder of SUGAR.
SUGAR was founded by Singh and Kaushik Mukherjee, both Indian Institute of Management-Ahmedabad alumni, in 2012. The company offers a range of make-up products and everyday skincare products.
While ecommerce still accounts for 50% of SUGAR’s revenue, the brand has also built an omni-channel distribution network that includes over 10,000 retail outlets across 130 cities in the country.
SUGAR had in October last year raised $2 million in debt led by venture debt firm Stride Ventures.
The cosmetics brand, operated by Vellvette Lifestyle Pvt Ltd, had got seed funding from early-stage venture capital firm India Quotient in 2013, according to VCCEdge. In 2017, Singapore-based RB Investments came as a new investor, followed by A91 Partners last year.
The cosmetics company’s revenue jumped six times in two years. It clocked net sales of Rs 105 crore in the year through March 2020. In the previous year, it had recorded net sales of Rs 57 crore
A leading VC house in India, Elevation Capital invests seed and early-stage capital across consumer internet, financial services, logistics, enterprise SaaS (software as a service), consumer brands and B2B (business-to-business) services.
Previously known as SAIF Partners, the 20-year-old firm rebranded to Elevation Capital in October last year and closed its seventh consecutive fund, dubbed SAIF Partners India VII, at $400 million. The latest fund takes the firm’s total assets under management to more than $2 billion.
Elevation Capital has been an early investor in startups such as Acko, FirstCry, Justdial, MakeMyTrip, Meesho, NoBroker, Paytm, ShareChat, Swiggy, Unacademy and Urban Company.
