Concentrating more on the B2B side of the business, Gurgaon-based hyper-local mobile commerce marketplace LazyLad shuts down its B2C segment laying off around 30 people.
Saurabh Singla, the co-founder and CEO of LazyLad confirmed the reports while speaking to Techcircle. “As you can see, the mobile app is not functional. We have shut down the business-to-commerce (B2C) segment of the business and are looking to pivot to the B2B side of the business,” he said.
LazyLad’s app gave access to neighbourhood retailers in six product categories that include flowers, daily groceries, fruits and vegetables, stationery, bakery and confectionery items, and meats and seafood.
Founded in April 2015 by IIT-Guwahati alumni Saurabh Singla, Paresh Goel and Ajay Sethi, LazyLad was the first startup selected for Green House Ventures’ (GHV) accelerator programme. It had raised about $100,000 in the seed round from Green House Ventures in May 2015.
LazyLad offered its services in Gurgaon, Chandigarh, Sirsa, Roorkee, Mohali, Panchkula and Zirakpur.
Run by Gurgaon-based Angular Technologies Pvt. Ltd, it was reported in February 2016 LazyLad was reportedly in advanced talks to raise $2.5 million from Japanese investors. The company was even planning to add 25 cities by the end of 2016. It was facilitating 700 orders per day.
However, the deal did not go through. In July last year, it had raised $500,000 (around Rs 3.18 crore) in its pre-Series A round of funding from Tekton Ventures’ founder and managing partner Jai Choi, Japan-based Sugashita Partners’ Kiyohiro Sugashita, and Japanese venture capitalist Hirokazu.
Many hyperlocal services are seen failing to make an impact in the market. Delhi-based hyperlocal grocery delivery service AAGAAR.com, run by Asankhya Retail Pvt. Ltd had also shut down operations recently.
Similarly, Chef Sanjeev Kapoor funded food delivery startup ZuperMeal and online fashion and lifestyle store Fashionara.com shuts shop.
