SoftBank Vision Fund (SVF) is one of the largest investors of online grocery delivery start-up, Gofers and is reportedly in the final stages of investing over $55 million in the company.
The Japan-based multinational conglomerate holds a 46% share in Grofers which makes it the start-up’s largest investor. However, this is not the company’s first investment, last year in 2019, SoftBank led Grofers’ Series F funding round that concluded the company’s worth to be over USD 220 million. Similarly in 2018, Grofers’ Series E funding round worth $53 million was also led by SoftBank Vision Fund.
According to certain reports, Grofers was infused with funds worth USD 43 million (INR 330 Crore approx.) from its Singapore entity, Grofers International back in November 2019.
Reviewing the statistics, till date from the past 12 funding rounds, Grofers has raised a total sum of around USD 610 million.
Coming back to the latest funding received by the online grocery delivery platform, its existing investors, KTB Ventures and Tiger Global Management invested a total of USD 30 million in the start-up.
However, as a matter of fact, the valuation of the company did not move a significant number after this year’s funding round when compared to last year’s. Grofers’ valuation remains unchanged between USD 650- 700 million.
Furthermore, as we are all aware of the COVID-19 outbreak and the situation in India, Grofers was in profit as most people were turning their heads towards online grocery delivery services as a precautionary measure to not step out of their houses and expose themselves to the Corona Virus. As claimed by the company, Grofers saw a 40% increase in demand and sales during the nation-wide lockdown in the past few months.
This year, Grofers also witnessed over 60% increase in their Gross Merchandise Value (GMV) compared to last year.
The online grocery delivery platform was founded back in 2013 by IIT graduates Saurabh Kumar and Albinder Dhindsa.
India has faced a lot of challenges in the past few months, people were losing jobs and the economy basically went to the toilet. The post-COVID-19 situation is yet to be witnessed but post-lockdown, the situation is trying to get better, with the government’s support, the economy will probably rise back up again very soon.
Coming back to the online grocery delivery market in India, Grofers has definitely been on the rise during the lockdown period and it continues to be that way but with the speculated entry of high-stake players such as Walmart’s Flipkart, Amazon and Reliance in this sector, the competition is likely to get fierce.
