Udaan, a B2B e-commerce platform, is now, valued at $2.5 billion (approx ₹17 crore) after it raised funding of $585 million (approx ₹4,171 crore) from Tencent, Lightspeed Venture partners, DST Global and a clutch of investors, cited Mint.
Vaibhav Gupta, co-founder, Udaan said, “With this fund raise we will focus on growing the marketplace, going deeper into existing categories, invest in our core capabilities like our tech marketplace platform, fulfilment and delivery, lending and payments. The idea is to build on our core capabilities both in terms of value and strategic advantage. We have a long term to building the business and the capital raised helps us focus on that long term strategic approach.”
The Bengaluru-based Udaan was founded by Amod Malviya, Sujeet Kumar and Vaibhav Gupta in 2016. It is aimed at making business easy in India, and making B2B commerce convenient and efficient.
Notably, the platform Udaan achieved its unicorn status in September 2018. So far, it has been one of the few startups to achieve a private valuation of $1 billion in the shortest possible time.
Martin Lau, President of Tencent, said, “Udaan’s unique approach can enhance the capabilities of millions of retail stores across India. It represents a powerful example of how technology can empower the business of small merchants, improve the efficiency of industries and bring benefits to consumers.”
As per its website, Udaan currently has operations across lifestyle, home and kitchen, staples, fruits and vegetables, FMCG, toys and general merchandise. The platform currently helps SMEs like small manufacturers, brands, mills, and farmers to sell their products across the country at a low cost.
The platform Udaan is enabling this business to business (B2B) transaction, bringing together all participants onto a single platform, be it the wholesaler, distributor, producer, and the small retail shop owner.
Sujeet Kumar, co-founder at Udaan, said, “B2B ecommerce is very India specific. There are unique ways of consumption, distributions. There are more than 50 million SMEs in India. It is both an opportunity and a challenge. There is more effort in building capabilities and learning.”
“We are excited to continue partnering with Udaan’s team as they build the leading B2B trade platform across categories in India,” said Saurabh Gupta, Managing Partner at DST Global.
Some of the significant startups, operating under the similar domain include Biizongo, Moglix, Jumbotail, Power2SME, ShopKirana, Just Buy Live, etc.