IAN invests in ShoeKonnect – its 22nd investment this year

Indian Angel Network (IAN) invested an undisclosed amount in ShoeKonnect, a business to business (B2B) marketplace for leather products. With ShoeKonnect, IAN has made the 22nd investment this year.

ShoeKonnect is a business to business (B2B) marketplace for leather products

ShoeKonnect is the first business venture of BizCrum, a family of connection centric B2B apps created to facilitate communication amongst entrepreneurs locally and globally. It is a mobile platform for the global footwear industry based out of Agra that makes it easy for the retailer to buy products directly from the manufacturer, reducing the cost and logistical issues.

Speaking at the announcement, Siddharth Vij, CEO & Co-Founder at ShoeKonnect, said, “We understand that there lies a huge gap among producers and buyers in the market. A gap that restricts the manufacturers from increasing their customer base and sales volumes and retailers from getting better variety and quality of products. With ShoeKonnect, we aim to bridge this existing gap.”

According to reports, India is the second largest footwear producer in the world, with footwear production accounting for approximately 9 per cent of the global annual production – 22 billion pairs as compared to China, which produces over 60 per cent of the global production. India annually produces 2.1 billion pairs of which 90 per cent are consumed internally while remaining are exported primarily to European nations which include United Kingdom, Germany, USA, Italy and France, as per market analysts.

Sahil Kejriwal, who has led this round of investment on behalf of IAN will further be joining the company board to monitor the team in becoming a market leader globally. Speaking on the same, he commented, “With changing lifestyles and increasing affluence, domestic demand for footwear is projected to propagate at a faster rate than it has been seen. With the growing challenges faced by SMB’s in the footwear sector related to quality, discovery and fulfilment Shoekonnect is well placed to explode”