AsiaTechDaily – Asia's Leading Tech and Startup Media Platform
Social commerce platform Meesho secures $570 million valuation soars to $4.9 billion
by
India-based social commerce platform Meesho has recently secured fresh funding of $570 million led by Fidelity Management & Research Company and B Capital, a firm owned by Facebook co-founder Eduardo Saverin. With this funding, the company has doubled its valuation to $4.9 billion.
The funding round also saw participation from existing investors- SoftBank Vision Fund 2, Prosus Ventures, and Facebook along with new investors- Trifecta Capital, Footpath Ventures, and Good Capital.
Since the last funding round which was five months ago, Meesho has recorded 2.5 times growth in its order volume. The company has added new product categories to its catalogue including fitness and sports, automotive accessories, and pet supplies.
Meesho plans to use this fresh funding to strengthen its research and development teams and acquire new users. The company targets to reach 100 million monthly transacting users by December 2022. To achieve this Meesho will deploy this capital to grow its product and technology team its selection to take in more than 50 million products.
The startup is also looking to expand its FMCG and groceries offerings with Meesho Grocery (Farmiso) and its community group buying business to more than 200 cities in India.
Kabir Narang, founding general partner at B Capital Group said, “We have evaluated e-commerce opportunities across emerging markets and are excited about Meesho’s focus on strong unit economics and a consumer-first approach. We are excited to partner with Meesho and its exceptional team that is democratizing e-commerce for a billion internet users across the country. Meesho’s business model has an incredibly compelling value proposition with entrepreneurs, end customers, and suppliers consolidating on one platform.”
Meesho entered the unicorn category after it secured $300 million in April this year. The funding then valued the company at $2.1 billion which was three times more than its previous funding round in 2019.
Vidit Aatrey, CEO of Meesho said in a statement, “Our focus will be on India, so we will continue to invest, to go deeper into the country, and find more people to come and sell on the platform. We plan to triple our tech and product team over the next 12 to 18 months. Our broad goal is to get 100 million monthly transacting customers on our platform by end of next year. At the beginning of this year, we started our grocery vertical, and we plan to double down significantly and grow this aggressively.”
