Cyril Amarchand Mangaldas Advises Info Edge on Raising INR 1,875 Crore through QIP

Cyril Amarchand Mangaldas acted as the legal counsel to the joint global coordinators and book running lead managers (JGC-BRLMs) in relation to a Qualified Institutions Placement (QIP) by Info Edge Limited (Info Edge). The JGC-BRLMs were Credit Suisse Securities (India) Private Limited, Goldman Sachs (India) Securities Private Limited, IIFL Securities Limited, and J.P. Morgan India Private Limited.

Info Edge is one of the key players in the online classifieds industry in India, operating through popular platforms such as www.naukri.com, www.99acres.com, and www.jeevansaathi.com, and with significant investments in Zomato Private Limited (Zomato), and Etechaces Marketing and Consulting Private Limited (PolicyBazaar and PaisaBazaar).

The Capital Markets Practice of Cyril Amarchand Mangaldas advised JGC-BRLMs on the Transaction. The Transaction team was led by Yash Ashar, Partner & Head - Capital Markets; and Gokul Rajan, Partner; with support from Shiv Bhargava, Senior Associate; Parth Desai, Associate; Shweta Agrawal, Associate; and Aniran Ghoshal, Associate.

As a part of the QIP transaction, 6,067,961 equity shares of Info Edge were issued, at a face value of INR 10 (Equity Shares) at a price of INR 3,090 per Equity Share, including a premium of INR 3,080 per Equity Share, aggregating to approximately INR 1875 crore.

Other parties involved in this Transaction included:

Credit Suisse Securities (India) Private Limited, Goldman Sachs (India) Securities Private Limited, IIFL Securities Limited and J.P. Morgan India Private Limited (acted as the joint-global coordinators and the book running lead managers to the Issue (JGC-BRLMs))

Latham & Watkins LLP (acted as the international legal counsel to the JGC-BRLMs)

The Transaction was launched on August 4, 2020 and concluded on August 7, 2020.

About Cyril Amarchand Mangaldas

Cyril Amarchand Mangaldas takes forward the values going back 103 years, of the erstwhile Amarchand & Mangaldas & Suresh A. Shroff & Co., whose pre-eminence, experience and reputation of almost a century has been unparalleled in the Indian legal fraternity. Tracing its professional lineage to 1917, the Firm of Cyril Amarchand Mangaldas is now the largest full-service law firm in India, with over 750 lawyers including over 141 partners, and offices in India's key business centres at Mumbai, New Delhi, Bengaluru, Hyderabad, Chennai and Ahmedabad. The Firm advises a large, and varied client base that includes domestic and foreign commercial enterprises, financial institutions, private equity funds, venture capital funds, start-ups and governmental and regulatory bodies.

The firm, Cyril Amarchand Mangaldas, was recently awarded with "India - Firm of the Year" at the AsiaLaw Regional Awards 2019 and "India Deal Firm of the Year" at the In-House Community Counsels of the Year Awards 2019. The firm was also named as the "Most Innovative National Law Firm of the Year - India for 2018" at the IFLR Asia Awards, having also been successful in winning the prestigious & coveted "National Law Firm of the Year, 2018 for India" at the Chambers Asia-Pacific Awards. The firm was also voted as the "Employer of Choice for 2018" from India, by the Asian Legal Business, now 4 years in a row, building upon the several awards that the erstwhile Amarchand & Mangaldas & Suresh A. Shroff & Co. had won in the past.

EdTech Platform Univariety Secures $1.1 Mn Funding from InfoEdge

Univariety, India’s leading edtech platform, today announced it has raised $1.1 Mn (INR 8 Cr) from India’s premier online giant Info Edge. In a span of two years, this is the second investment that Info Edge has led in the Hyderabad-based startup Univariety.  Info Edge is India’s premier online classifieds company in recruitment, matrimony, real estate and education with multiple leading sites like Naukri.com, 99acres, Jeevansaathi, etc..

This Primary Funding will be used by Univariety for Business Growth with a focus on product development, scaling up its alumni platform for Schools and deeper brand building. The products will be unique and will support the students & parents in making crucial decisions along the career journey.

Commenting on the investment, Hitesh Oberoi, Co-Promoter, MD and CEO, Info Edge said, “India is witnessing a growing need for students to make more informed choices about their future. Univariety has succeeded in making Career Guidance mainstream in K-12 education, by partnering with hundreds of top Schools. The next phase of Career Guidance is about preparing students for the Skills and Careers of the 21st Century, many of which don’t even exist today. Univariety is uniquely positioned to impact how Indian Students face Global competition beyond just College admissions. We believe it is ‘Career Guidance 2.0’.”

Univariety’s approach is one of a kind and ensures that guidance comes from multiple perspectives (psychometric tests, counselors, alumni, and universities). It is the only company in the category to have exclusive partnerships with top brands like UCLA, Fortune India, and many others.

Speaking about the latest fundraise, Mr. Jaideep Gupta, Founder, and CEO, Univariety said, “The fact that Info Edge has invested in us despite the gloomy external environment is invigorating. Univariety is deeply committed to making Career Guidance mainstream in Indian Schools. Our next phase of growth is focused on bringing in parents fully into the mix.  Our products & programs will help parents upgrade the definition of Success to beyond just the College Admissions.”

Hyderabad based Education focused Loestro Advisors was the sole advisor to this transaction.

 

About Univariety: Offering Guidance to 100,000+ Students

Owned and operated by International Educational Gateway, Univariety is an online marketplace with students at the center of the college admission process. It involves key stakeholders like Parents, Alumni and the School Management to deliver comprehensive Career Guidance for Students.

Incorporated in 2015 by Jaideep Gupta, Univariety offers blended (online & in-person) Career Guidance to Students in its partner Schools across 60+ cities in India.  Students can explore 75,000+ courses at up to 14,000 universities across ten countries on the Univariety Platform. Univariety is partnered with 350+ Schools in India and serves 100,000+ students.

Info Edge: An Overview

Since its inception in 1995, Info Edge has grown to become one of the most popular and successful online classified companies. Started with online recruitment business naukri.com, India-headquartered Info Edge is now the parent company of top online portals like 99acres, naukri.com, Jeevansathi.com, and online education platform Shiksha.com.

With a network of 62 offices located in 43 cities throughout India, it is India’s premier online classifieds company in recruitment, matrimony, real estate, education, and related services. According to the company’s filings, it has seen an increase in sales turnover with the last financial year closing at INR 1,209.41Cr. (total income as of March 2019).

Info Edge to Invest ₹ 37.10 Cr in E-Learning Platform Coding Ninja's Parent Co

Info Edge (India) Ltd on Monday said it will invest about Rs 37.10 crore in Sunrise Mentors Pvt Ltd that operates e-learning platform Coding Ninjas.

"The company has agreed to acquire shares for an aggregate amount of about Rs 37.10 crore (for a cash consideration) via a mix of primary and secondary purchase of shares," Info Edge said in a regulatory filing.

The firm's aggregate shareholding, post this investment, in Sunrise would be 25 per cent on a fully converted and diluted basis, it added.

Set up in May 2016, Sunrise primarily sells short-term to mid-term courses in programming and data sciences created by the in-house team.

These courses are primarily availed by job seekers looking to upskill and reskill themselves.

Recently, Sunrise also launched a new programme called Coding Ninjas Career Camp, which instead of charging students upfront for the courses, charges them after successfully placing them.

Sunrise had a turnover of Rs 5.57 crore as on March 31, 2019. PTI SR

Info Edge Creates Rs 750 Crore War Chest for its Maiden VC Fund to Invest in Tech Start-ups

Sanjeev Bikhchandani-led Info Edge, which owns and operates India's largest online job portal Naukri.com, has created a Rs 750 crore war chest for its maiden venture capital fund to invest in tech start-ups.

Noida-based Info Edge on Thursday informed stock exchanges that it has set up Info Edge Venture Fund (IEVF) to invest in "tech and tech-enabled entities that provide technology to create, market and distribute innovative products and services that benefit consumers at large."

While the filing put the contribution in the new fund at Rs 100 crore, sources in the company said what is being mentioned is just the initial amount and the planned fund size is Rs 750 crore.

Further contributions will be made into the Fund as investment opportunities are identified, they said, adding that the company management expects internal accruals from operations will be more than adequate for this purpose.

Info Edge, by setting up its own investment vehicle, joins the likes of home-grown technology titans Infosys and Wipro. Most other large Indian corporates have primarily preferred to invest from their respective balance sheets.

While Wipro through its strategic investment arm Wipro Ventures has closed its second investment fund - the USD 150 million Fund-II, Infosys - that launched its Innovation Fund in 2015, has invested in multiple startups.

On Thursday, Info Edge announced an investment of Rs 100 crore into a Category II AIF Info Edge Venture Fund sponsored by its wholly-owned subsidiary Smartweb Internet Services Ltd. This had led to some speculation that Info Edge has set up a 100 crore VC fund for investment in tech start-ups.

Sources said Rs 100 crore was only the initial capital and the corpus was as large as Rs 750 crore.

In the last three years, Info Edge has invested around Rs 800 crore in external start-ups, either directly or through its wholly-owned subsidiaries, and the investing activity is likely to continue at the same rate.

The Info Edge external investing programme is widely regarded as a success by both shareholders and the start-up community.

It has been a prolific investor in India's startup ecosystem, having backed companies, which have since then, emerged as some of the country's most richly-valued ventures, such as food delivery and restaurant recommendation company Zomato, and online insurance aggregator PolicyBazaar, both of which are in the fabled unicorn club.

Being the first investor in unicorns like Zomato and Policybazaar, it continues to be a meaningful shareholder in them.

Sources said as the investing activity has grown, the company felt the need to create an AIF through which investments would be made. This investment vehicle is a preferred route for a number of reasons, they said.

First, it would be more entrepreneur-friendly from a compliance, regulatory and angel tax perspective. Second, it would bring increased rigour and discipline into the Company's investment strategy. Third, it would bring more focus on the exit strategy. Fourth it would provide a structure where the company can attract and retain the best talent for VC investing through alignment of interests.

Sources also clarified that Info Edge Ventures will focus on making financial investments into start-ups. Strategic investments into start-ups in the jobs, real estate, matrimony, and education classified space will continue to be made directly through the parent Info Edge and its subsidiaries, as will acquisitions and any follow-up investments in existing portfolio companies.

The team managing new Investments at Info Edge Ventures will continue to manage the existing financial investment portfolio as well. And the team managing strategic investments (non-financial investments) shall remain the same as earlier. PTI ANZ ANZ

Info Edge to Sell Shares in Meritnation to Aakash Educational Services for Rs 50 Cr

Info Edge (India) Ltd on Friday said it will divest its total shareholding in Applect Learning Systems (Meritnation) to Aakash Educational Services for Rs 50 crore.

"...the company has, pursuant to the authorisation given by the Board of Directors on recommendation of the Audit Committee, entered into an agreement for divestment of its total shareholding, on fully converted and diluted basis, (including holding through its wholly owned subsidiary) in Applect Learning Systems Pvt Ltd (Meritnation)," a BSE filing said.

The shareholding has been agreed to be bought by Aakash Educational Services Ltd (AESL), which is one of India's largest medical test preparation providers, it added.

The filing did not disclose the number of shares involved in the transaction.

AESL has over 200 centres across 130 cities, teaching about 2.5 lakh students.

"Taking into consideration the independent valuation report, the sale value of the investment is determined as about Rs 50 crore," the filing said.

The transaction is expected to be completed by March 31, 2020, it added.

Meritnation delivers study material for students of kindergarten to class 12 (K-12). Its total sales in 2018-19 stood at Rs 34.76 crore. PTI SR

AgriTech Startup Gramophone Raises ₹24 Cr from Info Edge, Asha Impact and Better Capital

Agri-tech startup Gramophone on Tuesday said it has raised Rs 24 crore (USD 3.5 million) in funding from Info Edge, Raveen Sastry (Co-founder of Myntra.com), Asha Impact and Better Capital.

Info Edge is an existing investor in Gramophone, while Asha Impact is a platform founded by Vikram Gandhi (former Credit Suisse executive) and Pramod Bhasin (former President and CEO of Genpact), a statement said.

"The startup is rapidly scaling up its operations and will use the funds to expand across several states," it added.

Founded in 2016, Gramophone provides actionable agronomic insights coupled with last-mile delivery of agriculture inputs to farmers through a smartphone app and a call centre. The startup's last-mile delivery model has helped them serve over 2.5 lakh farmers in the remotest villages across central India.

Indore-based Agstack Technologies, which operates online marketplace for farmers Gramophone, had earlier secured ₹ 14 crore from Info Edge in April this year.

"We are excited to see how farmers are adopting newer opportunities to maximize their income. This investment will enable us to invest aggressively on product, data science and scale operations across geographies," Gramophone co-founder and CEO Tauseef Khan said.

In a BSE filing, Info Edge said it owned about 37.21 per cent of Agstack Technologies (Gramophone) as of June 30, 2019.

"Gramophone has signed a definitive agreement to raise funds from a couple of other investors, consequent to which the company's shareholding in Gramophone
stands reduced to about 33.21 per cent. The company has not participated in this round of fund raising by Gramophone," the filing added.

Khan clarified that Info Edge (India), in the first closing earlier this year, had invested through its wholly-owned subsidiary about Rs 14 crore in Gramophone.

"The remaining amount of Rs 10 crore has been received from our other investors, in the second closing of the same round," he added. PTI SR SR

Indore-based ShopKirana Raises $2Mn from Info Edge, Japan's AET Fund and Others

Indore-headquartered B2B e-commerce startup ShopKirana has raised $2 million in funding from Info Edge, along with Japan's AET Fund, Akatsuki and Incubate Fund and Better Capital AngelList syndicate.

Post this investment, Info Edge has now acquired 15.5 percent stake in Shopkirana, on a fully converted & diluted basis.

The funds raised will be used by the startup to expand its business operations across India as the startup is aiming to launch in ten cities by next year, targeting one lakh retailers and connecting farmers with retailers.

Prior to this fundraise, ShopKirana had raised an undisclosed amount in December 2016, which was its pre-series A round led by Lead Angels, Incubate fund and senior executives from top FMCG Companies. To date, Shopkirana has raised a total of $2.1 million in funding over four rounds.

Founded in 2015 by Deepak Dhanotiya, Sumit Ghorawat, Tanutejas Saraswat, Shopkirana is connecting brands & traditional brick-and-mortar retailers with the help of technology & supply chain innovation. ShopKirana aims to build biggest & fastest Go-To-Market platform for 90% of India's retail market which is unorganised and need to get transformed quickly.

According to Sumit Ghorawat, co-founder, ShopKirana, the startup has entered the growth phase and now plans to aggressively expand pan India.

"Unlike a lot of startups, we took inspiration from the McDonalds and the 7-Elevens of the world, where they did not open 100 stores on day 1. They operated one store initially, made the order taking streamlined, recipe standardized and then scaling became easy. Now, not just the leadership but my entire team is confident in scaling the business," he said.

Speaking on the investment, Kitty Agarwal, Head-Corporate Development, Info Edge, said, "We believe that the next frontier for internet businesses will be Bharat and not India. Shopkirana is servicing small retailers and empowering them to compete with organized retail and online players. The team is outstanding and has focused well on delivering the proof of concept with promising economics. They are addressing a large problem and we look forward to working with them closely."

Tomoya Ogawa, Managing Director of AET Fund (Akatsuki Entertainment Technology Fund) and CFO of Akatsuki, said, "We're thrilled to partner up with ShopKirana. We aim to realize the delightful lifestyle change of retailers by transferring our global expertise on entertainment including gamification."

Tokyo-based AET Fund is a venture capital fund specializing in the intersection of entertainment and technology. The fund actively invests in new forms of entertainment such as streaming services, voice assist, the gamification of existing industries and spreads beyond the bounds of conventional categories such as games, music, sports, beauty and fitness.

Traditional retail is still the bigger part of the market in India, and Ghorawat said that the company was targeting a 5% market share over the next five years, which would translate into sales of $3-5 billion.

Source - Economic Times, MoneyControl

Zomato Raises Fresh Funding of $210 Mn from Alibaba's Ant Financials

Gurgaon-based restaurant discovery and food-delivery app, Zomato, has raised a fresh capital of $210 million from Alibaba's payment affiliate Ant Financial, which has already made an investment of $200 million in the company in February this year. The investment will be for a little over 10% stake in Zomato.

In May this year, IndianWeb2 first reported about the possibility of this funding round of Zomato. Zomato was reportedly in talks to raise another fresh $200 million from Alibaba after its February funding round.

In a stock exchange filing on Friday, Zomato's oldest backer Info Edge disclosed that it's ownership in the company will fall from 30.91% to 27.68% as a result of the fresh capital infusion from Alipay Singapore Holding Pte. Ltd or other affiliates of Ant Financial.

"We would like to bring to your knowledge that Zomato has signed a definitive agreement to undertake a primary fund raise of approximately USD 210 million from Alipay Singapore," said Info Edge in the filing.

The latest funding comes within a week after it was reported that Zomato is in process of launching its own digital payments and mobile wallet solution in order to prevent its users going out of its ecosystem while making payments online

Post this latest funding, Zomato is valued at around $2 billion, up from its valuation of $1.5 billion in its last fund-raise.

With this funding, Ant Financial, which already held 20-22% stake in Zomato, has now become the largest shareholder in the company securing largest share close to Info Edge's 27.68% stake post-dilution.

So far, Zomato has raised a total of $651 million in funding over 11 rounds including this one.

The fundraising for Zomato is likely to continue as its rival Swiggy is in talks to $500-700 million from Alibaba rival and WeChat application owner Tencent besides existing backer Naspers at a valuation of $2.5-3 billion, as ET reported last month.

Zomato has also held talks Ctrip, a largest online travel portal of China, to invest in the possible round of about $400 million. Both Zomato and its largest competitor Swiggy have also held talks with Softbank Vision Fund.

Source - Economic Times

WaterBridge & Infoedge Invests in Kota-based MedCords, An AI-Enabled Healthcare Startup

Early stage venture fund, WaterBridge Ventures, announced today that it along with Infoedge has invested an undisclosed amount in MedCords, a startup based in Kota, Rajasthan with a technology center in Pune. MedCords is working predominantly in Rural India taking a patient first approach with a vision of making healthcare accessible, affordable and efficient for all by leveraging cutting edge Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Data Science technologies.

The company aims to become the "real time" healthcare decision making tool for citizens, organizations and state governments to eradicate problems and implement efficient healthcare processes. The funds will be used to expand the team, further develop the technology platform and to expand the scope of operations to new geographies.

More than 85% people in India do not have their medical records organized and at one place. 80% people living in villages have to travel 60 kms for the consultation and out-of-pocket expense on healthcare in India is close to 60% of total spends. The founders have seen the healthcare scenario first hand and after extensive research of 3 years across 800 villages of Rajasthan, MP, UP & Bihar and 2 pilots, they began developing MedCords in late 2016 and we went live in May 2017.

MedCords is founded by Nikhil Baheti, Saida Dhanavath & Shreyans Mehta. The startup is currently operational in Kota and Jhalawar districts with a technology center in Pune. They are a digital health partner for the Smart City Kota project and are a recipient of prestigious Bhamashah Technofund funding under Rajasthan Government’s Istart Program.

MedCords’s co-founder Nikhil Baheti, explaining the product said, “MedCords is a cloud-based, ML powered ecosystem that connects and enables various stakeholders of the healthcare ecosystem. The ecosystem facilitates, amongst other things, remote consultations and follow-up consultations with doctors and intelligent digitization of users' medical records and on-demand availability of such records. The venture aims to create IP out of medical data and advanced analytics to create efficient healthcare decision systems for doctors, hospitals and the government.”

Shreyans spoke about the journey and said, “The biggest challenges initially which we faced was that there was no benchmark which we had to follow, most of the people in rural areas either did not have smartphones or they had a very limited know how of how to operate them- but they were in dire need of a solution. So, we had to build a solution which was ultra-simple and addressed to 80% of India’s Population.”

Saida added that “The healthcare ecosystem is extremely fragmented and to stitch it together for the users is an exciting challenge that we wake up to solve every day”.

“The challenge of providing effective health care to India’s rural population is a massive one. We are impressed by the MedCords team’s passion and technology driven approach to solving this problem. We are privileged to partner with Shreyans, Nikhil and Saida on their journey”, said Sarbvir Singh, Managing Partner, WaterBridge Ventures.

In March this year, Waterbridge led ₹3.5 crore funding of Gurgaon-based Doubtnut, a multi lingual online learning platform for students.

Founded in 2016, by investment veterans Manish Kheterpal (ex Providence, Actis, Rho Ventures) and Sarbvir Singh (ex Capital18, Citi), WaterBridge Ventures is an early stage venture fund with a founders first philosophy. The first fund with a corpus of $40M has a portfolio of 15 start-ups and tends to be the first institutional investor backing strong and persistent founders leading technology disruption across sectors. WaterBridge has invested in several market leading companies such as Unacademy, Chalo, ZipLoan, MagicPin, Social Cops and Dataweave.

Info Edge Invests Additional ₹3 Crore in Real Estate Tech Startup Zippserv

Info Edge (India), the parent firm of Naukri.com & 99acres, announced that it has invested through its wholly-owned subsidiary, approximately Rs 30 million (~ US$0.4 million) in Bangalore-based Zippserv, a technology-driven real estate risk assessment platform. With this investment, Info Edge has picked up substantial 45% stake in the Ideaclicks Infolabs, which owns and operates Zippserv.

Earlier in May 2017, Info Edge had invested Rs 2.4 crores in ZippServ for 28% stake. And, with the latest additional fresh investment, Info Edge now owna 73% of majority stake in Zippserv.

Founded in 2015 by Debashish Hota and Sudeep Anandapuram, Zippserv provides a comprehensive real estate risk assessment platform covering legal and technical/civil engineering due diligence, encroachment & fraud detection services all under one roof.

The platform essentially empowers buyers by removing the information asymmetry that exists in todays real estate sector, has recently expanded into other markets and launched an array of products -- CleanProperties and PricePoint.

CleanProperties provides instant access to land titles, conversion records, building approvals, liens and litigations for thousands of ongoing apartment projects. While PricePoint's analytics engine tracks lakhs of recently registered sale transactions and gives granular actionable insights for buyers at a project level so that buyers get an advantage in negotiations.

Zippserv currently has over 400 under construction projects listed in Bangalore and it claims that this will be expanded to 1000 plus projects in the next few months. The platform lists out all the information a home buyer needs in order to begin their property search. Buyers can start their home buying journey by looking at a curated list of projects in the locality/ neighbourhood where they intend to buy.

Previous Activity in Real Estate-Tech

Recently, Brigade REAP, the first accelerator in Asia to focus on Real Estate, on-boarded 5 Realty startups for its fourth Cohort. With over 80 start-ups having applied to the program, 11 Start-ups were shortlisted out of which 5 were inducted into the program.

Last July, Bengaluru-based QwikSpec, an end-to-end real-estate site operations platform startup, had raised Rs. 3.5 crores in funding from a consortium of investors led by Brigade Innovations LLP and industry veteran Mohandas Pai.

Last year in January, Reliance Group-backed oline to offline (O2O) real estate transaction startup, Square Yards, raised $10 million funding in the form of convertible notes from multiple individual investors primarily based outside India.

Prior to this, Quikr India bought HDFC Realty and HDFC Developers, real estate-based subsidiaries of HDFC Bank, in an all stocks deal to become India’s leading online-to-offline real estate platform and offer consumers end-to-end home buying services.

Info Edge Investments

Speaking about Info Edge's investment history, the company is known for supporting big brand ventures in their early days. It has invested in Zomato, Policybazaar, Meritnation, BigStylist and other startups, in their early days.

Recently, Info Edge announced that it had signed an agreement with SoftBank to jointly invest USD 90 million in Etechaces Marketing and Consulting, the parent of PolicyBazaar.

In June 2016, Info Edge had also acquired minority stake in two startups -- VCare Technologies and Unnati Online Pvt Ltd. VCare offers phone directory app called Diro Labs; and Unnati runs a  platform called Unnati Helpers to hire domestic help.

Source - Economic Times

[Top Image - Zippserv Team | Via - YourStory.com]

Naukri.com Invests ₹3 Crore in ShoeKonnect, A B2B Marketplace for Footwear

Naukri.com's parent company Info Edge India has invested Rs 3 crore in Delhi-based ShoeKonnect, which is an online B2B marketplace startup for global footwear industry.

The funds raised will be used by the startup for strengthening its technology base to scale up operations and expansion in terms of the userbase of footwear buyers and sellers across India.

Founded in 2014 by Siddharth Vij, Chaitanya Rathi and Siddharth Rastogi, ShoeKonnect is a B2B commerce mobile application designed specifically to cater to the needs of the footwear industry. It helps footwear enterprises to connect and communicate with each other and expand their business.

“The investment will help strengthen the technology base of the company to scale up operations and expansion in terms of the user base (Footwear Buyers and Sellers across India). So, the core focus shall be improving technology and expanding the user base - buyers and sellers on the platform” said Siddharth Vij, cofounder & CEO, ShoeKonnect.

ShoeKonnect's proof of concept (POC) stage is almost complete and the platform is getting significant traction from the footwear retailers, whole sellers and manufacturers across India, claims the startup. Currently, it claims to have 2000 plus buyers (retailers/distributors) and 200 plus sellers (brands/manufacturers/stockiest) on its platform with a monthly gross merchandise volume (GMV) of more than Rs 70 lakh.

“We are targeting to reach Rs 10 crore monthly GMV with keen focus on repetition and wallet share of bulk buyers and sellers” added Vij, who's family runs footwear and apparel manufacturing businesses in Agra.

Earlier in October 2016, the startup had raised undisclosed amount in seed funding from Indian Angel Network. Naukri.com's parent company Info Edge India has invested Rs 3 crore in Delhi-based ShoeKonnect, which is an online B2B marketplace startup for global footwear industry.

The funds raised will be used by the startup for strengthening its technology base to scale up operations and expansion in terms of the userbase of footwear buyers and sellers across India.

Founded in 2014 by Siddharth Vij, Chaitanya Rathi and Siddharth Rastogi, ShoeKonnect is a B2B commerce mobile application designed specifically to cater to the needs of the footwear industry. It helps footwear enterprises to connect and communicate with each other and expand their business.

“The investment will help strengthen the technology base of the company to scale up operations and expansion in terms of the user base (Footwear Buyers and Sellers across India). So, the core focus shall be improving technology and expanding the user base - buyers and sellers on the platform” said Siddharth Vij, cofounder & CEO, ShoeKonnect.

ShoeKonnect's proof of concept (POC) stage is almost complete and the platform is getting significant traction from the footwear retailers, whole sellers and manufacturers across India, claims the startup. Currently, it claims to have 2000 plus buyers (retailers/distributors) and 200 plus sellers (brands/manufacturers/stockiest) on its platform with a monthly gross merchandise volume (GMV) of more than Rs 70 lakh.

“We are targeting to reach Rs 10 crore monthly GMV with keen focus on repetition and wallet share of bulk buyers and sellers” added Vij, who's family runs footwear and apparel manufacturing businesses in Agra.

Earlier in October 2016, the startup had raised undisclosed amount in seed funding from Indian Angel Network.

The above news was first reported in Economic Times.

Naukri.com or Info Edge (India), which is a listed company, have been early stage investor in many other dot com startups including Zomato.com, Meritnation.com, Policybazaar.com, mydala.com, Happilyunmarried.com, Canvera.com, Vacationlabs.com, bigstylist.com and bluedolph.in.

India is the fastest-growing online retail market in the world. As per the report, e-commerce sales in India will reach $64 billion by 2021, growing at a five-year compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 31.2%.
Besides,India’s total footwear market size is $6 billion, wherein $4 billion is domestic and rest comes from exports. In the domestic market, a large chunk of market comes from unorganized players, while only 20% is organized play.

Nearly, 30000 plus manufactures and whole-sellers are located in cities like Agra, Kanpur, Mumbai, Chennai, Kerala, Jaipur, Punjab and NCR. There are 4000 plus registered shoe brands and nearly six lakh shoe retailers spread across India.

Salon-At-Home Startup BigStylist Raises Rs 6 Cr from Info Edge

Info Edge, the owner of online classifieds Naukri and 99acres, has invested another Rs. 6 Crores in salon-at-home start-up BigStylist. Info Edge had invested Rs 6.4 crore in BigStylist in August last year in what was its first new investment in nearly three years. This is a bridge round which will help the start-up break even and raise more money from external investors.

BigStylist was founded in July by IIT-Kharagpur graduates Richa Singh, Anurag Srivastava and Chinmaya Sharma. Chinmaya and Richa are both ex-management consultants having worked with Bain & Co. and Oliver Wyman, post MBAs from IIM-Bangalore and IIM- Ahmedabad, respectively. Anurag, who is the CTO, was previously with payroll automation firm ADP.

Customers can order beauty services via the company's website, Android mobile app or by phone. BigStylist, has served more than 25,000 customers in Mumbai and Pune since launch last year.

Info Edge, which is also an investor in Zomato, has backed several other startups including PolicyBazaar, Mydala, Happily Unmarried and Meritnation. "Beauty and wellness as a vertical will see at least 2 or 3 specialists create significant value and scale-up. This round is a vote of confidence in the execution and performance shown thus far by the company," Info Edge founder Sanjeev Bikhchandani said in a statement.

Beauty and wellness services is pegged as a $10-billion industry in India, growing at 20% year-on-year, attracting investor interest.

Info Edge Picks Up Minority Stake in Two Startups - Vcare Technologies & Unnati Online

Info Edge (India) Ltd, the parent company of Naurki.com and 99Acres, has acquired minority stake in two startups–VCare Technologies and Unnati Online Pvt Ltd. VCare offers phone directory app called Diro Labs; and Unnati runs a  platform called Unnati Helpers to hire domestic help.

According to a stock market filing, Info Edge has invested Rs. 30 million (Around $447 million) through convertible preference shares to acquire a 11.5 per cent stake, on fully converted and diluted basis, in Vcare Technologies Pvt Ltd. It further said, it had invested  Rs. 40 million (around $596 million) through convertible preference shares for acquiring about 28.5% stake in Unnati Online Pvt Ltd.

Lately, Info Edge is pouring a lot of money in early stage companies, startup ventures to tap into the growing and vibrant Indian e-commerce market. In January, Info Edge Ltd, acquired a 35 per cent stake in Delhi-based Rare Media Company for a little over $1 million, before which it acquired 25% stake in on-demand beauty services marketplace BigStylist for about $1 million. It has also invested  in e-commerce marketplaces including Zomato, Meritnation, Policybazaar, Mydala, and Happily Unmarried.

Diro Labs allows users to make groups of contacts, back them up on cloud, and connect contacts with social media. The startup is based out of Delhi, and also has offices in the US and the UK. It was founded in 2014 by Vishal Gupta, Sumeet Singh and Nikhil Rai. Diro Labs competes with phone contacts management app InTouchApp, which recently raised seed funding from Blume Ventures.

Unnati Helpers provides housekeeping services providers for households and businesses. The Gurgaon-based company was founded in 2014 by Shantanu Singh, Eral Ravi and Aashutosh Chaudhary. Unnati Helpers competes with startups such as BookMyBai.com, which raised around $150,000 in November 2015, and Didi, an on-demand platform that provides housekeeping services, which secured an equal amount in angel funding the same month.

Info Edge runs a slew of consumer internet properties such as Naukri, 99acres, Jeevansathi and Shiksha. It posted a standalone net profit of Rs 141.58 crore for 2015-16 compared with Rs 193.86 crore the year before.

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