Milkbasket Raises $ 5.5 Mn in Funding led by Inflection Point Ventures

•  Round led by Inflection Point Ventures


• First angel network to invest in Series B


• Existing investors Blume Ventures, Kalaari Capital, Mayfield India, Unilever Ventures and BeeNext have also participated

World's first daily contact-less delivery service and one of India's biggest grocery delivery startup Milkbasket has closed a fresh round of investment led by Inflection Point Ventures with existing investors for $ 5.5 ,million, as it continues to grow its operations across India and maintain its market leader position in the daily grocery delivery space. 

Inflection Point Ventures has emerged as the only angel platform in India to lead a Series B round in a startup. The Angel Platform, started in 2018, has been investing in startups across high potential sectors like health tech, delivery, ed tech and telemedicine at rational valuations.

Vinay Bansal, Founder CEO, Inflection Point Ventures, says, "We believe that Milkbasket has a unique customer-centric model and enjoys a very high degree of loyalty from its customers. Their understanding and application of technology which helps them execute single day deliveries and even accept orders till midnight gives them an edge over other players operating in the same category. Additionally, Milkbasket has a very lean delivery model using the milk-run concept that enables them to run a very efficient and cost-effective supply chain. This will help them become profitable very soon and first among the various competitive players in the market."

Milkbasket has demonstrated exponential growth to achieve a market leader position in the daily e-grocery industry. With advanced and deep technology across the full-stack supply chain from sourcing to last-mile delivery, Milkbasket today serves over 130,000 households and fulfills an entire household needs with 9000+ products across fruits & vegetables, dairy, bakery and all other FMCG categories. It is currently operating in Gurgaon, Noida, Dwarka, Ghaziabad, Hyderabad and Bangalore.

Anant Goel, Co-Founder, CEO, Milkbasket, says, "This is probably our last fund raise on our path to profitability – that we target to achieve in 2020. Our Gurgaon, Noida and Bangalore operations are already breaking even with other cities on an accelerated track. These funds will provide a further boost in our efforts to achieve the same and necessary buffers to deal with any eventualities.”

A pioneer in contactless delivery, with over 3,00,00,000 orders delivered till date, Milkbasket is an undisputed market leader in the daily grocery delivery space. The company has built a new-age technology platform to enable frequent and frictionless buying with unique features like contactless delivery, one-click buying, and no checkout - all a first in the e-commerce industry.

Since the lockdown began, the company has been at the forefront, serving families with essential food and household items. The company also launched services like MbBulk and SCO (Senior Citizens Only) Helpline across multiple cities to help people sustain the lockdown without venturing out for groceries. Senior citizen grocery helpline was launched to help the elderly who didn't have their sons and daughters with them and were in particularly at risk due to the outbreak. Milkbasket staff wears masks and gloves at all times and undergoes daily symptom assessment tests. 

Founded in 2015 by Anant Goel, Ashish Goel, Anurag Jain and Yatish Talvadia, Milkbasket's vision is to become the default mom & pop shop for over a million households by 2021. Having achieved positive unit economics within the first six months of the launch, Milkbasket is the most capital-efficient model in the online grocery space as compared to its domestic and global peers. 

Inflection Point Ventures is an initiative of accomplished CXOs & Angel Investors who firmly believe that ‘Everyone can Grow with Startups’. Started in 2018, IPV has invested in across 40+ startups. IPV’s investors’ base is currently at 2000 seeing a massive influx of highly accomplished CXOs and HNIs who are looking to invest in startups with rational valuation and sustainable business model.

Milkbasket Acquires Bengaluru-based PSR Supply Chain

Online grocery delivery startup Milkbasket has acquired Bengaluru-based PSR Supply chain for an undisclosed amount.

Set up in 2015 by Nagarjuna Reddy Chagamreddy and Sai Abhishek Velukuru, PSR Supply Chain is a local e-grocery store, and Milkbasket has integrated the startup’s customers and offering into its portfolio, Milkbasket said in a statement.

PSR Supply Chain has ceased operations as of June. In four years of operations, the company established a network of over 4,000 registered customers and its last reported annual turnover was over Rs 2.5 crore.

“The acquisition of PSR Supply Chain helps us in further strengthening our customer base and offerings in Bangalore. While we are growing phenomenally on our own, we are always on the lookout for strategic acquisitions to help us shorten our learnings in specific regions or technologies,” Milkbasket co-founder and CEO Anant Goel said.

The acquisition came within about a month after Milkbasket had raised $10.5 million in a funding led by Unilever Ventures, with participation from Mayfield India, Kalaari Capital, and Blume Ventures and few Indian family offices

Having launched its operations in early 2015, Milkbasket now has a network of over 4,000 registered customers and its last reported annual turnover was over ₹2.5 crore.

Earlier in March this year, Milkbasket had acquired Veggie India, a Noida-based e-commerce firm selling Organic fruits and vegetables.

Milkbasket Raises $2.16 Mn in Follow-on Funding from Innoven Capital

Grocery delivery startup Milkbasket has raised ₹15 crore (~US$2.167 Mn) from venture debt firm Innoven Capital, which is in addition to US$ 10.5 million (around Rs 72.59 crore) the company had raised earlier this month led by Unilever Ventures, with participation from Mayfield India, Kalaari Capital, Blume Ventures and few Indian family offices.

The funding comes within a month after the startup had last raised $10.5 million in its Series B round. Notably, in this month only, Milkbasket's ₹20-crore debt funding deal with Sachin Bansal-led BACQ fell through.

“The fresh investment positions us firmly for continued growth, and we will be investing substantially in geographical expansion, new technological advancements and hiring through the year,” Anant Goel, Co-founder and CEO, Milkbasket said in a statement.

Goel further said “this is a testament to our proven pioneering model and a solid team that is transforming everyday lives of urban households in India”.

In April, Milkbasket had announced a ₹20 crore debt funding deal from Bansal’s BACQ. However, in June, the startup then put out a press statement clarifying that "Milkbasket and (Bansal’s) BACQ have mutually decided not to proceed with the investment that was announced on April 29, 2019."

To date, Milkbasket has raised close to $26 million in equity funding from Mayfield, Beenext, Kalaari Capital, Unilever Ventures, Lenovo Capital (LCIH), Blume Ventures and few family offices.

Milkbasket had last raised $10.5 million in its Series B round this month.

Milkbasket Raises fresh $10.5 Mn from Unilever Ventures, Mayfield India, others

Within a few weeks after raising Rs 20 crore in venture debt funding led by Flipkart co-founder Sachin Bansal’s BAC Acquisitions, grocery delivery startup Milkbasket has raised an additional US$10.5 million (~ ₹ 69.20 crore) in a fresh round of funding led by Unilever Ventures, with participation from Mayfield India, Kalaari Capital, and Blume Ventures and few Indian family offices, reported Times of India,

"While the industry is witnessing a number of players adopting our model, this funding - our largest fund infusion till date - is a testament to our robust execution, the team and continued trust of our investors in the growth of Milkbasket," Milkbasket Co-founder and CEO Anant Goel said in a statement.

According to the startup, more than 70% of its revenue comes from non-milk products, from the wide assortment of over 8,500 stock keeping units.

In last 6-7 months, Gurgaon headquartered Milkbasket has launched its services in four cities across India with Bengaluru being the latest.

"We are steadily and surely moving towards our goal of achieving USD 1 billion annual recurring revenue in 2021. Together with investing in talent and geographic expansion, Milkbasket continues to invest in customer centric innovation, and this funding will help us focus on all the three areas to build a national market leader in online grocery," Goel added.

To date, Milkbasket has raised a total of about $32.7 million in funding over eight rounds from Mayfield Advisors, Beenext, Kalaari Capital, Unilever Ventures, Lenovo Capital (LCIH), Blume Ventures and few family offices.

MilkBasket Raises $2.85 Mn in Debt Funding from Sachin Bansal's BAC Acquisitions

Gurgaon headquartered grocery and milk delivery startup MilkBasket has raised an additional Rs 20 crore ( ~ US$2.863 million) in venture debt led by Flipkart co-founder Sachin Bansal’s BAC Acquisitions, reported Economic Times citing sources.

With this funding, Milkbasket has raised close to $19 million in total from seven rounds since its inception in 2015. Prior to this, the company had last raised $7 million in Series A from Mayfield Fund, in December.

Mikbasket, which competes with ZopNow, Supr Daily, Country Delight and DailyNinja, counts high profile investos as it backers that include Kalaari Capital, Unilever Ventures, EVC Ventures, BeeNext, and Blume Ventures.

Launched in 2015, by Anant Goel, Anurag Jain, Ashish Goel, Ekwe Chiwundu Charles and Yatish Talavdia, Milkbasket is touted as India's first subscription-based micro-delivery service fulfilling daily dairy essentials and household needs of consumers. The company closed FY18 with Rs 35 crore in revenue.

Last month, Milkbasket made its first acquisition when it acquired Noida-based Veggie India, an online store for organic fruits and vegetables.

Sequoia-backed DailyNinja, also a hyper-local delivery startup for milk and groceries, had raised $5.5 million from Matrix Partners India, in September last year. The closest competitor of Milkbasket has raied total of $10 Mn and made two small acquisitions of -- WakeupBasket and 4amShop, both based out of Hyderabad.4

Mumbai-based SuprDaily, which is backed by Y Combinator, is also into daily subscription business for milk along with bread, eggs, coconut water, etc.. SuprDaily has raised a total of ₹10 crore in funding over three rounds, accoding to the data by Crunchbase.

Notably all three -- MilkBasket, DailyNinja and SuprDaily were launched in same year of 2015 when Indian startup space was going through funding crunch.

Milkbasket Raises Pre-series A Round from Blume Ventures and Lenovo Capital

Milkbasket, India’s first daily micro-delivery grocery startup has secured an undisclosed amount from prominent investors Blume Ventures, Lenovo Capital and Incubator Group (LCIG). This is Milkbasket’s third round of funding. In December, a few Milkbasket customers together with Empower Investment, Hofan Capital and Draphant participated in their second round of funding. In April 2016, the company raised $500,000 in pre-Series A round led by EVC Ventures and Chinese Investors including Peter Zou, CEO of YeahMobi, and Li Jian, founder of Zhu Dao Investments. Snapdeal vice presidents Vikas Banga and Manav Kamboj also invested as well.

The funding will be utilized to expand operations in Gurgaon and hire critical manpower in technology, supply chain, and operations departments. EVC and certain angel investors, who initially invested in Milkbasket, are reported to have exited in this round.

“We have studied the inadequacies of the supply chain in groceries in depth and see a huge potential to add value at both supply and demand side”, said Anant Goel, Co-founder, and CEO of Milkbasket. “We hope this investment will help us fulfill our aim to simplify the currently fragmented supply chain and use technology to expand operations to cater to more societies in Gurgaon.”

Milkbasket, launched in early 2015, currently serves over 10,000 families across 115 societies in Gurgaon. Built on the unique Indian habit of getting fresh milk delivered at home every morning, Milkbasket is today fulfilling the entire grocery needs of a household before 7:00am every day. There is no minimum order and no delivery charges. An order can be placed by any member of the household till midnight and gets delivered to the doorstep early morning, every morning.

To enable frequent and frictionless buying, Milkbasket has introduced flexi-ordering and contactless delivery - both a first in the e-commerce industry - and favorites of Milkbasket customers.

"Anant and team at Milkbasket have understood the ingrained milkman habit in Indian homes, leveraged that simple habit, and taken the customer experience of getting any groceries home-delivered to an altogether new level. It's easy as getting morning papers! And in that simplicity lays the beauty of the model. We look forward to the partnership which will allow what's taken Gurgaon by storm to reach several other cities eventually." said Karthik Reddy, managing partner at Blume Ventures, a venture capital firm which has also invested in companies like OLA and GreyOrange.

Milkbasket has till date completed 1.5 million orders and controls the end to end user experience with a completely technology led in-house procurement and logistics model.

“The team at Milkbasket is doing a great job of eliminating the problems that exist in the on-demand grocery industry and we couldn’t be more excited about this collaboration”, said Jeffrey Wang, Managing Director of Lenovo Capital and Incubator Group (LCIG).

“By reducing the last mile logistics cost to a fraction of the industry (1/20th) and removing a real pain area of customers, Milkbasket has cracked the online grocery delivery model for India. We aspire to be serving a million families, every day, in the next 5 years and our belief is further solidified with this round of funding by two internationally recognized players” added Anant.

By perfecting the supply chain management, Milkbasket envisions a day when a customer will be able to order absolutely anything before midnight and get the delivery before 7 AM the next day.

Milkbasket Raises Pre-series A Round from Blume Ventures and Lenovo Capital

Milkbasket, India’s first daily micro-delivery grocery startup has secured an undisclosed amount from prominent investors Blume Ventures, Lenovo Capital and Incubator Group (LCIG). This is Milkbasket’s third round of funding. In December, a few Milkbasket customers together with Empower Investment, Hofan Capital and Draphant participated in their second round of funding. In April 2016, the company raised $500,000 in pre-Series A round led by EVC Ventures and Chinese Investors including Peter Zou, CEO of YeahMobi, and Li Jian, founder of Zhu Dao Investments. Snapdeal vice presidents Vikas Banga and Manav Kamboj also invested as well.

The funding will be utilized to expand operations in Gurgaon and hire critical manpower in technology, supply chain, and operations departments. EVC and certain angel investors, who initially invested in Milkbasket, are reported to have exited in this round.

“We have studied the inadequacies of the supply chain in groceries in depth and see a huge potential to add value at both supply and demand side”, said Anant Goel, Co-founder, and CEO of Milkbasket. “We hope this investment will help us fulfill our aim to simplify the currently fragmented supply chain and use technology to expand operations to cater to more societies in Gurgaon.”

Milkbasket, launched in early 2015, currently serves over 10,000 families across 115 societies in Gurgaon. Built on the unique Indian habit of getting fresh milk delivered at home every morning, Milkbasket is today fulfilling the entire grocery needs of a household before 7:00am every day. There is no minimum order and no delivery charges. An order can be placed by any member of the household till midnight and gets delivered to the doorstep early morning, every morning.

To enable frequent and frictionless buying, Milkbasket has introduced flexi-ordering and contactless delivery - both a first in the e-commerce industry - and favorites of Milkbasket customers.

"Anant and team at Milkbasket have understood the ingrained milkman habit in Indian homes, leveraged that simple habit, and taken the customer experience of getting any groceries home-delivered to an altogether new level. It's easy as getting morning papers! And in that simplicity lays the beauty of the model. We look forward to the partnership which will allow what's taken Gurgaon by storm to reach several other cities eventually." said Karthik Reddy, managing partner at Blume Ventures, a venture capital firm which has also invested in companies like OLA and GreyOrange.

Milkbasket has till date completed 1.5 million orders and controls the end to end user experience with a completely technology led in-house procurement and logistics model.

“The team at Milkbasket is doing a great job of eliminating the problems that exist in the on-demand grocery industry and we couldn’t be more excited about this collaboration”, said Jeffrey Wang, Managing Director of Lenovo Capital and Incubator Group (LCIG).

“By reducing the last mile logistics cost to a fraction of the industry (1/20th) and removing a real pain area of customers, Milkbasket has cracked the online grocery delivery model for India. We aspire to be serving a million families, every day, in the next 5 years and our belief is further solidified with this round of funding by two internationally recognized players” added Anant.

By perfecting the supply chain management, Milkbasket envisions a day when a customer will be able to order absolutely anything before midnight and get the delivery before 7 AM the next day.

Gurgaon Based Milkbasket Raises $500K in Pre-Series A Round of Funding

Gurgaon-based micro-delivery eCommerce company, Milkbasket that was founded in early 2015 by Anant Goel, Ashish Goel, Anurag Jain and Yatish Talvadia, has raised $500,000 in pre-Series A round led by EVC Ventures and Chinese Investors including Peter Zou, CEO of YeahMobi, and Li Jian, founder of Zhu Dao Investments. Snapdeal vice presidents Vikas Banga and Manav Kamboj also invested as well.

"We will use this fund to expand the core team, further enhance our technology and beef up the logistics. We are aiming for a 10x growth in customers in the next four to five months and increase per customer spend by 2.5 to three times during this time," said Anant Goel, CEO of Milkbasket.

The startup is a subscription-based asset-light micro-delivery service fulfilling daily grocery and household needs of customers. It is currently operates in 15 clusters in Gurgaon, each cluster with a user base of around 500. Starting with only milk delivery, Milkbasket now offers over 3,000 products through a hybrid inventory model to maximize product margins while controlling costs. Its app has recorded about 1,000 downloads so far.

The company would focus on establishing itself in Gurgaon before expanding to other geographies. It also is expanding its offering portfolio with an aim to cover all daily needs of customers. Over the next 6 months, Milkbasket aims to grow to a 250-strong organization with 80%  workforce in logistics and serving over 15,000 orders a day across more than 100 clusters in Gurgaon.

The funding comes at a time when the hyperlocal grocery space faces a tough period. A few days back, Sequoia backed most heavily funded startup PepperTap closed its hyperlocal delivery business. In January, hyperlocal grocery and fresh food delivery startup Grofers shut down its operations in nine cities and in October 2015, Mumbai-based LocalBanya, a three-year-old online supermarket, stopped taking orders.

Gurgaon Based Milkbasket Raises $500K in Pre-Series A Round of Funding

Gurgaon-based micro-delivery eCommerce company, Milkbasket that was founded in early 2015 by Anant Goel, Ashish Goel, Anurag Jain and Yatish Talvadia, has raised $500,000 in pre-Series A round led by EVC Ventures and Chinese Investors including Peter Zou, CEO of YeahMobi, and Li Jian, founder of Zhu Dao Investments. Snapdeal vice presidents Vikas Banga and Manav Kamboj also invested as well.

"We will use this fund to expand the core team, further enhance our technology and beef up the logistics. We are aiming for a 10x growth in customers in the next four to five months and increase per customer spend by 2.5 to three times during this time," said Anant Goel, CEO of Milkbasket.

The startup is a subscription-based asset-light micro-delivery service fulfilling daily grocery and household needs of customers. It is currently operates in 15 clusters in Gurgaon, each cluster with a user base of around 500. Starting with only milk delivery, Milkbasket now offers over 3,000 products through a hybrid inventory model to maximize product margins while controlling costs. Its app has recorded about 1,000 downloads so far.

The company would focus on establishing itself in Gurgaon before expanding to other geographies. It also is expanding its offering portfolio with an aim to cover all daily needs of customers. Over the next 6 months, Milkbasket aims to grow to a 250-strong organization with 80%  workforce in logistics and serving over 15,000 orders a day across more than 100 clusters in Gurgaon.

The funding comes at a time when the hyperlocal grocery space faces a tough period. A few days back, Sequoia backed most heavily funded startup PepperTap closed its hyperlocal delivery business. In January, hyperlocal grocery and fresh food delivery startup Grofers shut down its operations in nine cities and in October 2015, Mumbai-based LocalBanya, a three-year-old online supermarket, stopped taking orders.