Ras Beauty Pvt. Ltd, which operates beauty and personal care (BPC) brand RAS Luxury Oils, on Monday said it has raised $2 million (around Rs 15 crore) in a pre-series A funding round from Sixth Sense Ventures.
The startup plans to deploy the fresh capital to deepen inroads into the Indian and select overseas luxury skincare markets. It also aims to accelerate its product innovation.
“We plan to transform the global beauty and skincare market as a Made-in-India brand that speaks to a discerning global consumer. Sixth Sense’s platform and founder Nikhil Vora's business insights, strategic direction are valuable to us," said Shubhika Jain, founder & CEO, RAS.
Founded in 2017 by Shubhika Jain, Suramya Jain and Sangeeta Jain, RAS claims to offer beauty and skincare products with natural ingredients and potent scientific formulations, manufactured at the startup’s proprietary vertically-integrated research facility and farms in Raipur, Chhattisgarh.
The company said it has witnessed 20x growth in the last two years, and is aiming to further disrupt the global clean beauty and skincare market which is expected to reach $54 billion by 2027.
“RAS is perfectly aligned with our investment philosophy of betting on challenger brands. There is a white space within luxury skincare as a category in India, and it is growing 2-3 times faster than the personal care category because it is brand starved. Furthermore, skincare brands from India are underrepresented globally. We believe that with such a dynamic, young and strong leadership team, RAS has the ability to create a strong niche for itself. Their differentiated positioning can make RAS stand out in the currently crowded beauty industry," said Nikhil Vora, Founder and CEO of Sixth Sense Ventures.
The funding round by RAS Luxury Oils comes at a time when the BPC segment in the startup ecosystem is seeing significant interest from investors even as a funding winter prevails.
Earlier this month, Wow Skin announced raising primary capital an undisclosed amount from Singapore’s sovereign wealth fund, GIC.
The beauty and personal care segment has not been not averse to acquisitions as well. Earlier in May, VCCircle exclusively reported that Honasa Consumer-operated skincare brand, Mamaearth announced picking up a majority stake in Dr Sheth’s, an addition to the unicorn’s recent spree of acquisitions.
Recently, personal care brand Plum was also said to be in advanced stages of discussion with multiple local private equity funds and growth-stage investors to raise around $25 million in a Series C round of funding.