Bangalore- and California-based Meesho, an online marketplace for resellers, has raised $3.44 million (Rs 22.4 crore) in fresh funding, a person familiar with the development told VCCircle.
The company raised the funds from a bunch of angels, another person said. Around 17 investors put in money.
However, TechCrunch reported a day later, citing a company announcement, that it was a Series A funding round led by venture capital firm SAIF Partners. Existing investors Venture Highway and Y Combinator also participated in the round, the report said.
E-mail queries, text messages and repeated calls to Meesho's co-founder and CEO Vidit Aatrey seeking confirmation did not elicit a response. Co-founder and chief technology officer Sanjeev Barnwal also did not respond to e-mail queries.
Meesho was among the three Indian startups chosen by Y Combinator for its summer 2016 batch. That was the first time the Silicon Valley-based seed accelerator on-boarded Indian startups. Y Combinator typically invests $120,000 in tech startups, and picks up a 7% stake.
Meesho, run by Fashnear Techologies Pvt. Ltd, is based out of Bangalore. It also has an entity incorporated in California, US, called Meesho Inc.
Prior to this, the company had raised a couple of angel rounds. In August 2016, it raised an undisclosed amount from a bunch of investors including Kashyap Deorah, co-founder of HyperTrack; Mauritius-based VH Capital; Maninder Gulati, chief strategy officer at OYO Rooms; and Jaspreet Bindra, senior vice president at Mahindra & Mahindra.
In May 2016, it raised an undisclosed sum from Sunstone Business School co-founder and director Rajul Garg, who is also an active angel investor.
Founded in 2015 by IIT Delhi alumni Aatrey and Barnwal, Meesho allows sellers to set up an online shop through its platform. It also facilitates sharing on other social media platforms such as WhatsApp, Facebook and Pinterest, among others. According to information on its Google Play page, the Meesho app has on-boarded more than 20,000 re-sellers and seen over 50,000 downloads.
Aatrey previously worked with InMobi and ITC while Barnwal has worked with consumer electronics companies Sony and Samsung in the past.
Many e-commerce enablers have attracted investor interest of late.
Last month, Bangalore-based e-commerce solutions and consultancy firm Ace Turtle Services Pvt. Ltd raised an undisclosed sum from venture debt firm InnoVen Capital. In May, it had raised a Series A round from Vertex and Singapore-based C31 Ventures, the venture investment arm of developer CapitaLand.
In August, Zepo Technologies Pvt. Ltd, which runs a do-it-yourself e-commerce platform for small businesses, raised Rs 3.19 crore from a clutch of investors including online funding platform LetsVenture, FreeCharge co-founder Kunal Shah, and People Group founder Anupam Mittal.
In June, Singapore- and Bangalore-based Shopmatic had raised $5.7 million in a Series A round from ACP Pte Ltd, a technology-focussed venture capital firm, and Spring Seeds Capital Pte. Ltd, the investment subsidiary of SPRING Singapore. In the same month, cloud-based product discovery platform Unbxd Inc raised $12.5 million (Rs 80 crore) in Series C funding.
In May, Singapore- and Pune-based Anchanto raised an undisclosed amount from Luxasia Group, a Singapore-headquartered omni-channel retailer of beauty products.
* This article has been updated to include details on the funding round and names of investors as per media reports
