The e-commerce sector has once again shown how powerful it has become in the economy and how much capital has been flowing into it since the inception of the start-up boom. The latest entry into large investment rounds has been Pepperfry. The online furniture retailer has raised a massive $100 million from Goldman Sachs, Zodius Technology Fund, and existing investors Bertelsmann India Investments and Norwest Venture Partners.
This is the fourth round of funding and will be used to strengthen the company’s logistics, technology platform, experience centres and marketing efforts. Earlier, Pepperfry had raised $28 million in its previous three rounds.
“We will benefit tremendously from the global insight of Goldman Sachs and the business savvy of Zodius as they join the Pepperfry board. The investment will help us expand our presence and invest in strengthening our operations,” said Pepperfry founder and CEO Ambareesh Murty
Currently, the company has more than $2 million customers and reaches out to more than 300 cities across the country.
“We will utilise the fresh capital to expand our logistics footprint in tier III and Tier IV cities by taking our fleet of delivery vehicles from 350 to 1,000 in the next 12 months,” he said.
The funding will also be used to expand the company’s presence to 20 cities including Pune, Gurgaon, Kochi, Kolkata, Lucknow and Chandigarh.
Murty also plans to quadruple Pepperfry’s technology and engineering team with a focus on leveraging augmented reality on mobile. This will help buyers have a better buying experience as the aided visual options will assist in deciding to buy and what not to.
“Goldman Sachs continues to back high-quality local entrepreneurs to build significant businesses that create and deliver value to the everyday lives of the country’s young, billion plus population,” Goldman Sachs Asia Co-Head Private Equity Ankur Sahu said.
The furniture market currently stands at $25-$35 billion in India but online sales take only a minor part of the entire share. However, it has been projected that the number is predicted to reach $70 billion by 2020. There is a big chance that e-commerce will play a major role in this development.
